Mirror Images Collabaration fanfiction
by LaurathegLeek
Summary: Collab fanfiction with mate-4-life /u/2326352 parts in Alyce's POV are written by Lizzy, parts in Scarlett's POV are written by me. Enjoy x
1. There's two sides to everything

_**(A.H.P)**_

'DAAAD! I NEED HELP!' I called loudly from the train side as I tried to heave my trunk onto the step

'one second, Ally' My dad said from a while off, talking to one of the mums of my future school mates - or otherwise,

'Stop flirting and get your lazy ass over here monkey man!' I told him firmly and jokingly, I always called my dad monkey man, it was a joke that had lasted for as long as I could remember 'I could be enemies with her kid by the end of this year!'

'sorry,' he apologised to the women he was talking to and separated himself from her, she shrugged and walked down towards the farthest end of the platform. Finally my dad joined me and lifted my trunk into the carriage with ease.

'thanks dad' I said happily 'ooh I'm going to Hogwarts' I let the excitement build up inside again but stopped short of bouncing on the spot.

'well I hope you have a good time, but don't go forgetting about me okay?' he told me

'I'll write to you every week, I promise' I told him grinning

'good, and remember to feed Lalita before long journeys home, I'd like to see her again some time' he reminded me

'I will and you'll see her every week when she brings my letters! And you better reply!' I ordered him

'well if Lalita is still alive I will' he said laughing, he tickled me slightly as I looked offended. I couldn't help but let out a giggle. Then I saw something that made my skin crawl, or rather - someone. Strangely this person looked just like me.

'what's up tyke?' Dad asked as I fell silent

'don't look now dad but the wicked witch of the west is at 10 o'clock' I told him, not taking my eyes off of the girl and her mother moving through the crowd. Dad turned around unaffected then suddenly, spotted them and turned back to me quickly

'she was always one to be late for everything' he said, clearly talking about my mother, I had meant my twin but one man's treasure is another man's poison, right?

'she's not late, we were early' I told him dismissively, I watched my mother help Scarlett put her trunk onto a carriage about 5 away from mine.

'maybe I should wish your sister good luck on her first day' Dad pondered

'oh dad, don't make me go see her!' I begged

'sorry honey, but she's my daughter too' he told me, I gave in and left my bag on the train hoping it would be okay.

We reached them as they managed to get their trunk into the train compartment, I watched my sister as dad made pleasantries with my mother quickly and moved onto Scarlett, wishing her luck and hugging her. It was funny, my twin seemed smaller to me, but she was still the same size as me. Her honey blonde hair that reflected the shade exactly of mine fell over her shoulders neatly, and she had clearly put on make-up but compared to last time I saw her (and by that I mean we had plastered ourselves in mum's red lipstick last time I visited as we were quite small) there was barely any on her at all and to people who didn't know her it would be almost impossible to tell. I pretended to be nice but forced myself not to speak to my sister as I wasn't sure how nice I could be when I was so excited; I didn't really care but I knew dad wanted us to get along or at least be civil to each other.

Luckily for us the whistle went and I ran back to my carriage to put my bag in a safe place and get a seat. I held my trunk in the corner as I waved goodbye to my dad out of the window on the door. I made my way down the compartments, the first one that had a spare seat had another young girl in it but I asked to join her anyway.

'I'm Luna Lovegood, who are you?' she asked me as I put my trunk onto the luggage rail along with my owl, Lalita.

'my name is Alyce Harmony Paiper' I said formally 'nice to meet you'

'would you like to buy a copy of the quibbler?' she offered me, seemingly not taking in the information

'oh no thanks, I read proper newspapers like the daily profit and teen-witch weekly, what are you doing selling junk like that?'

'my fathers the editor' she said sternly 'don't stand up for too long, the nargles might try to trip you up'. Oh great, this is going to be a murderous journey.

_**(S.V.P)**_

'Mummy? Is this the only way to get onto the platform?' I asked while tugging at her sleeve and stared up at her with tears brimming in my eyes 'w-w-what if I don't make it through and I crash?' I continued to whimper at her.

'Scarlett, honey, you will be fine! I was just like you when I first started at Hogwarts' she reassured me while patting my shoulder lightly.

'Really Mummy?' I said as I glanced up at her.

'Of course! Every First year's like it.' She replied giving me a big beaming smile like she always did when I was nervous.

Whilst all of this was going on we heard more trolleys coming up behind us and a kind woman's voice could be heard saying:

'Now come on boys show Ginny what she has to do. Also, Fred and George Weasley I am begging you **please** don't misbehave this year as this is the year before you sit your O.W.L.S and I'm not planning on keeping you at Hogwarts if I get anymore letters from Dumbledore if this happens you can work in the Ministry with your father – I mean it! – George don't give me that look!'

My mum and I turned around to see who had just spoken and was faced with a sea of redheads and one boy with brown hair – OMG HARRY POTTER the most famous wizard EVER? - I also clocked two identical looking boys – they must be Fred and George who had just been given a lecture by the plump looking woman who I assumed was their mum. There was one more than particularly stood out to me; the one standing next to Harry Potter was clearly the youngest of the redhead boys and he was angelically beautiful, I just couldn't take my eyes off of him after they had settled. The women also turned round and stared at my mum with the most amazing expression on her face as she took both of us in and then started talking nineteen to the dozen with tonnes of questions all aimed at my poor mum;

'Lucy? Lucy Kirk? Is that really you? How is life going with John Paiper? Oh silly me! You must have changed your name to Lucy Paiper by now, right?' The kindly woman then came down to my level and said in the most kindest voice I've heard: 'who are you then? I must say you look the spitting image of your dear mum.'

With that I looked up at my mum and asked her if I was allowed to tell her my full name; she replied:

'Of course you can my love, this is Molly Prewitt darling; although I'm under no illusion that you and Arthur ended up tying the knot then? Which makes her Molly Weasley. For the record John and I got divorced when the girls were aged six. So then I went back to Lucy Kirk.'

Molly Weasley then put a kindly smile on her face (which everybody seemed to do when my mum mentioned the 'D' word) and said to me; 'well then tell me who are my dear. I'm assuming just like my, only, daughter Ginny here you're starting Hogwarts this year?'

'I'm Scarlett Victoria Paiper!' I beamed at her – I loved introducing myself formally – 'it's lovely to meet you all; hey Ginny? Would you like to tackle this horrible wall together?'

'Yeah sure! I'd love too! Hey can we be best mates?' She replied with a bigger smile then I normally wore.

'Duhhh! Of course! Come-on Ginny lets go!' I yelled and shut my eyes as I ran at the aforementioned wall with Ginny on my heels with her trolley.

As soon as I opened my eyes I saw a bright red steam train in front of me and I let out a gasp; not because of the train but because of the two people I saw walking towards the train…

'MU-UM!' I yelled behind me 'You never told me that the wife of Satan was going to Hogwarts too!'

'SCARLETT VICTORIA PAIPER! That is no way to talk about your sister like that!'

'But you always call her that at home, why can't I call her what she really is?'

'Just. Get. Onto. The. Train. NOW!' She screamed at me.

'Alright, fine I'm going! Coming, Ginny?' I huffily replied.

'Yup coming Scarlett, bye Mum! I promise to write when I get the chance, see you lot at the feast!' She called behind her at her family and of course Harry.

With that we jumped on the train – five carriages away from Alyce – and settled into our seats and then I let out my tabby cat out and put her onto my lap.

'Aww she's pretty what's her name?' Ginny asked me whilst stroking her.

'Thanks, her name's Biscuit but everyone calls her Bicky.' I replied whilst stroking her too, then I let her down so that she could roam the carriage alone. 'So tell me, how in Merlin's name do **know** Harry Potter?' I half-screamed at her

'Haha! He's my brother, Ron's, best mate. He's so nice…' She replied in a dreamy kind of way

'OOOOO someone's in love!' I replied

'Oh shut up Scarlett like I didn't see you clocking Ron and my other brother's like that!' She laughed and playfully punched my arm,

'Scarlett?' I heard my mum's voice from beyond the window and looked out, mum spotted us through the window and came over, pulling my trunk behind her. I had totally forgotten about it at the wall, I must have been even more nervous than I realised… or excited. Then I realised my mouth was open slightly and closed it quickly,

'can you watch Biscuit?' I asked Ginny, getting up. She nodded friendlily and I left the compartment. 'Sorry mum I forgot' I told her jumping off of the train.

She helped me lift the trunk on quickly as I was in a hurry to join my new friend again. We slid the trunk firmly across the floor of the train as somebody cleared their throat behind us. We turned around to find the wife of Satan and my father standing there. As usual Alyce was giving me evils and I returned them without hesitation, suddenly my father turned to me, he wished me good luck and hugged me, I muttered a reluctant thank you to him but never returned the embrace. Soon he pulled away looking slightly disappointed, my sister, if that is what I have to call her, still had her usual bad attempt at an evil look on her face, I stared back at her with what I was certain must have been a better attempt than hers as everyone fell silent. Suddenly the whistle blew and the train let out an extra puff of steam. Finally my unfortunate relatives left me in a rush, allowing me to hop back on the train. I yelled a final goodbye to my mum from the window and pulled my trunk back to the company of Ginny who smiled at my entrance. This journey and the rest of my school life was going to be a breeze…


	2. Their new world

_**(S.V.P)**_

After our eight-hour journey on the Hogwarts express we finally pitched up at Hogsmeade Station to be met by a big giant of a man calling us all to get into a boat and then, apparently, we would make our way across the big lake to Hogwarts. Before Ginny and I had had time to even think about dashing in front of the crowd of newbies, we were stopped by Ginny's twin brothers who said to us in not too blunt terms:

'Hey you two snot faces! Have fun on the boats lets just hope you don't drown and Ginny if you don't get into Gryffindor we are **all** disowning you!' They said whilst standing there beaming at us and then they ran off in the opposite direction giggling like two over-sized schoolgirls.

'Seriously Scarlett, those boys will do everything in their power to annoy me won't they?'

'Trust me on this on Ginny. My sister will do a heck of a lot worse to me… I just know it!' I replied while we ran to get to the good boats, which we did!

Once we got off the boats we were told to assemble outside the big wooden double doors that would open into the Great Hall. I was getting more and more nervous as the minutes dragged on and that was when I saw her, out of the corner of my eye, standing to my left…

'Hello Alyce, and how are you on this fine evening? It was lovely to see Daddy helping you with your trunk, even when we were five you were his favour-…' I trailed off as I saw the most murderous look plastered on my twin sisters face

'Oh just shut up will you! I don't give a flying car what you think of Dad and me that's mine and his business so JUST STAY OUT OF IT! GOT IT?' With that she turned on her heel and walked towards a group of sour faced looking boys and girls.

'W-W-Well if that's the way you want to play it then fine! I don't need you and him anyway; I've got Ginny now!' As soon as I had said that I turned around to scan the crowd with tears running down my cheeks looking frantically for Ginny, any of her brothers or even Harry. My eyes immediately met Ginny's and she ran towards me with her arms outstretched and pulled me into a tight hug and whispered into my ear

'Your sister is so mean! But hey like you said you've got me and my whole family, including Harry, and we won't let her hurt you so just stick by us OK?'

'Thanks Ginny, you truly are the best friend a girl could ask for' I gave her a watery smile back whilst wiping the tears from my eyes.

Whilst this was all going on a stern looking woman with her hair in a bun but a kindness in her eyes came outside to the crowd of us nervous first years introduced herself as Professor McGonagall and started telling us what we would expect when we entered the Great Hall; once she had finished the doors swung open to reveal four big tables and lots and lots of glittering candles hanging in mid-air! As we were walking down the middle of the hall I also caught a glimpse of the ceiling – it looked exactly the same as the night sky outside, this school really was magic! I felt eyes on us from all angles, especially as we reached the center of the room, I stood up straighter and walked slightly closer to Ginny, soon we reached the front of the hall where we all assembled ourselves into a neat-ish huddle to await our fate with the battered old witches hat sitting on the stool in front of the long staff table – my heart was in my mouth by this point I was so nervous I thought I was going to pass out; I grasped around until I found Ginny's hand and we both held onto our hands nice and tightly so as to reassure one another that we would be fine – then Professor McGonagall produced a very long piece of parchment and started to recite peoples names and one by one they walked up to the stool, had the hat placed on their head (which then shouted the house name at the whole hall) and then moved to sit at their respective table. Before too long the little huddle had grown smaller in size and I was convinced I could feel a distinct breeze because of it…

'Lovegood, Luna' Professor McGonagall announced from next to the stool and we all watched as a girl with white blonde hair, literally, floated towards the stool and sat on it had the hat placed on her head and after a few seconds we heard;

'RAVENCLAW!' and with that the girl called Luna jumped down off the stool and made her way over to the table with the blue banner with a Raven on it to sit down.

After this I noticed that there was nobody else after Luna so that meant it would go straight to:

'Paiper, Alyce' so there went my twin sister up to the stool and practically snatched the hat from Professor McGonagall and slammed it down on her head, after a few antagonizing minutes the hat **finally** decided on:

'SLYTHERIN!' so my sister got off of the stool, shot a smirk in my general direction and went off to the table with a green banner hanging over it and sat down next to a pug-faced girl and a boy with slicked back blond hair and a devilish expression all over his face – _hmmm __**maybe**__ that house wasn__'__t so bad after all if they had boys like him in it_ I thought to myself – suddenly Professor McGonagall's voice shook me out of my wandering mind because she said to the silent hall the **second** thing I'd been dreading all evening;

'Paiper, Scarlett' - _OK lets just get to the get to the stool and __**please**__ don__'__t fall over! Just get to the stool and sit down; that__'__s all you have to do… _ - I thought this to myself over and over as I made the walk up to the stool. I made it without making a fool of myself – yay! – As the hat was placed upon my head it started talking to me in a whispered tone

'Hmmm…. Where **am** I going to place you? Seeing as you have the same surname as your sister Alyce I could put you in Slytherin… But then again you have a kinder mind and heart then she does so are you a Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw or Gryffindor? Hmmm… OK well as everybody knows in this hall the Slytherins and Gryffindors have a massive history of rivalry and that much is obvious of you and your sister, which means you are the new member of… GRYFFINDOR!'

As soon as the hat spit the name of the house out to the hall the table to my right let out a massive cheer and so off I jumped to join them, I caught the eyes of Fred and George who winked at me as I slipped in next to a boy who was looking nervous but still smiled and introduced himself as Neville Longbottom as I joined him at the table; I returned the smile proudly. I then turned around to watch as Professor McGonagall called out:

'Weasely, Ginerva' and there was my best friend walking semi-confidently up to the exact same stool I'd just been sitting on moments before and before the hat touched a strand of her hair the hat had already made it's decision:

'GRYFFINDOR!' Loud cheers could be heard from every angle of my house table and as soon as Ginny stepped down from the stool I ran at her and took her into a welcoming hug, which she returned with equal excitement.

'YAY! We're both Gryffindors go us!' She said whilst still hugging me; I caught a glimpse of my sister out of the corner of my eye and took my opportunity to stick my tongue out at her (oooo was that the best evil expression she could muster?) we eventually finished hugging and sat down and it was then that I realized who was missing…

'Erm… Where exactly is Ron? I haven't seen him all evening…' I asked despondently.

'Yeah that's a good point! I haven't seen Harry either… Oh I hope they're both OK…' Ginny replied with equal disappointment in her voice

'Oh cheer up you two! The boy's will be here soon, and if not then you will definitely see them at breakfast; that's one thing Ron will **never** miss!' The twins piped up from opposite us 'now come on! Tuck in! The food's gorgeous!'

So that was that! We tucked in and then were lead out by the prefects up to our dormitory and slept like two very sound logs… Yet my dreams were plagued with nightmares of both Ron and Harry out in the big wide world lost and alone – perfect!

_**(A.H.P)**_

'Paiper, Alyce' Oh gosh this was it, my life stops for this moment, this could shape my future or end it… no I can't think like that - wait, why would it end it? I left the thinning line of first years slowly, the time seemed to be slowing down so I could consider my fate. Which house did I want to be in? Ravenclaw like my father? Gryffindor like my mother? Or one of the others? Would I be in the same house as Scarlett? Or would we be enemies forever? I thought back to what had happened outside of the hall:

_I walked up the stairs and stood nervously alone in the centre, I had seen Scarlett ahead of me at one point to the right so I inched slowly away to the left. But then her voice came to my ear:_

'_Hello Alyce, and how are you on this fine evening? It was lovely to see Daddy helping you with your trunk, even when we were five you were his favour-…' Anger raged in my already dry, nervous throat and I couldn't help but shout out at her_

'_Oh just shut up will you! I don't give a flying car what you think of Dad and me that's mine and his business so JUST STAY OUT OF IT! GOT IT?' I turned and walked away to the other side of the staircase angrily; I heard Scary-Scarlett shout something else at me but in the effort to keep my legs from wobbling with nerves I didn't take in anything of what she had said._

_Just then a women joined us in the hallway, she stood authoritatively at the top of the staircase. She was a thin-lipped, stern woman with her hair in a bun so tight it almost looked as if it was holding up her face, she looked generally unpleasant but many of my fellow first years scattered around me seemed to be impressed rather than detested._

I reached the hat at last, conscious of how long it had been since I left my space in the now tiny huddle of children I tried to partially take hold of the hat as I sat down and tried to hide in it - unfortunately it never worked and it just fell to the middle of my ears, resting on my nose like a pair of oversized glasses. As my dad had promised the hat spoke softly into my ear

'ooh quite a cunning one, aren't you? Makes my life a lot easier-if that's what you can call it, a life-, you've had a bit of a difficult life I can see but don't worry you'll be fine at Hogwarts. You have gone through a lot, courage lies in your heart and mind even a bit of loyalty but I feel that you'd clearly fit best in… SLYTHERIN!' it yelled the last word over the hall and I knew people were judging me now more than ever. I took off the hat and joined the table laden with Green decorations, fortunately green is my colour, one of the few differences between Scarlett and I is that I have slightly greener eyes. I had sat in the first empty seat to the left side of my was a seemingly younger first year complaining that she had hat hair, pathetic, but straight away I had someone next to me on my right trying to get my attention. I looked towards them, it was a girl in one of the older year groups sitting with a lot of boys.

'Did anyone say you could sit there?' she told me angrily

'did anyone say you could sit _**there**_?' I asked her patronisingly 'I can sit where I like'

'leave the kid alone, Pansy' one of the boys beside her said, I had been reluctant to break eye contact with her so I missed who had said it but when I looked away I noticed a young boy with slicked back blonde hair wink at me subtly, I suddenly felt quite nervous again, this really was a different world for me.

'alright, I like your attitude kid, you're ok with me' the girl called Pansy said 'I'm Pansy Parkinson, if you hang with me don't expect me to be nice to the other houses' well she sounded just like my type of friend.

'who's that?' the blonde boy asked quietly 'she looks so much like you' I realised suddenly he was talking to me; about Scarlett

'oh' I said shocked, 'my identical twin, we might look the same but we're completely different, she's atrocious as a person. We don't see eye-to-eye…at all' I added quickly. He didn't respond, most people don't when it comes to the identical twins hating each other sort of conversations… they're just awkward. I watched my sister's ginger friend get sorted into Gryffindor and share a hug with Scarlett, gross.

'and if you ever try that to me, I will hex you into oblivion' Pansy told me, not much louder than a whisper

'I wont believe me, I hate all that sort of stuff, she's a total girly-girl but I need my personal space!' I said

'sounds like my type of women' the blonde boy said laughing slightly with the thuggish looking boys beside him, I wasn't sure how to take it or even who he was talking about,

'good, have you got any mates in Hogwarts yet?' Pansy asked ignoring the boys behind her

'no, I met this girl on the train but I hated her' I told her sourly 'someone called Luna Lovegood, she tried to sell me the quibbler'

'why's she selling that junk?'

'that's what I said, I prefer teen-witch weekly and things like that, but it turns out her dad's the editor'

We continued to talk in hushed voices until food appeared on the golden plates in the centre of the table. We helped ourselves to food now talking more openly. Soon however the boys stole Pansy's attention away.

'Oh I forgot to introduce you' she told me quickly as she noticed I'd fallen silent 'these are my friends; this is Draco-' she gestured at the blonde boy

'Malfoy,' he added in a voice as slick as his hair 'Draco Malfoy'

'then there's Vincent Crabbe and Gregory Goyle' Pansy continued 'but we just call them by their surnames… And Blaise Zambini' she added now gesturing at the darker-skinned boy, on the surface he looked skinny but I could tell that under his Jumper there were firm muscles already building on at least his upper arms. Letting the boys get quickly back into conversation Pansy quickly added to me in the quietest whisper I had heard that night, or at least it seemed so in the loud noise of the room:

'it's okay if you don't want to hang around with them much, I don't all the time. Draco's a bit of a womanizer and Crabbe and Goyle are just idiots at times, they can be quite difficult to talk to. Blaise tags along with them lot the most but he talks to me more than the others do generally.' As I took this information in she turned to the boys and continued the conversation she had been involved in. I scanned the room, there were a sea of ginger people at the Gryffindor table, clashing slightly with their decorations, among them was Scarlett with our blonde hair standing out and a boy with brown hair, I could only see the back of his head and so couldn't see what he looked like but he looked rather nervous as he was hunched and keeping himself to himself, well Scarlett does have that effect of people. My real interest was the boy directly opposite him, one of two identical twins it seemed, he was part of the group Scarlett was in but he was such a vision, I didn't care. Unlike his look-a-like he was laughing and was clearly centre of attention at this point. Soon I found myself in a day-dream and realised I had begun to stare at the starry ceiling, hypnotised by it. A shooting star flew across my line of view but it wasn't that which brought me back to my senses.

'aren't you going to eat?' Pansy asked me 'the food will disappear any min-' the food vanished replaced again by clean golden cutlery.

'I'll be fine, I wasn't hungry' I lied to her 'I ate a lot on the train'

Just then Dumbledore, the headmaster stood up at the front of the hall and made a speech -something to do with having a good year and some people going off into the village we had _**just**_ came from, so I didn't really see the point. After that I just stopped listening although I did here his final words: off to bed; pip, pip' what IS he talking about? the mad raving lunatic, he's running the school? really?

The whole room exploded with noise, Pansy pointed me in the right direction to find the Slytherin prefect and I ran off to see the massive man in front of me telling all the first years to follow him.

He lead the group of us down into the dungeons it had a slightly eerie feel which gave me an adrenaline rush, I just knew I'd love strolling through these passages for the next seven years. Then he lead us through a gap in the wall guarded by a portrait, and told us where our dormitories are. I was sharing mine with three other girls but they were all annoying and too chatty so I didn't bother to learn their names. I just unpacked my pyjamas and changed, then drifted off into an easy sleep.


	3. Leaving Footprints

_**(A.H.P)**_

My life began the next morning, for someone who was so worn out the previous night surprisingly I woke up early, and extremely refreshed. I looked around the dormitory I hadn't looked properly the night before.

There were jade green curtains hanging around the four beds. Someone had put some black and green material on the trunk at the end of my bed, I pulled them closer to investigate, there were three items: a cloak, jumper and a tie. All had the colour of the curtains on them, paired with silver and black, and the Slytherin serpent on the chest of the cloak. I felt a certain amount of affection and pride towards them, they looked almost royal, in a baggy, itchy sort of way.

I climbed out of bed trying to stay quiet and changed for the first time into my new robes and looked into the mirror.

'Tuck in your shirt!' it ordered me loudly. I shushed it quickly hoping not to wake up the others as they were slowly becoming conscious. Was this mirror here last night?

'brush your hair girl!' the mirror ordered once I had tucked in my shirt, I would've got to that! I walked away from the mirror to finish changing, I dug out some tights from my possessions and my new shiny school shoes. I brushed my hair and tried to choose a style to put it in for that day, I never usually cared but this was my first day and first impressions count… apparently. So how did I want to be seen? Especially to the hot guys, if I already found one -in Gryffindor- then there had to be ones just as good looking in my house, surely? And if not, how did I want the vision of Gryffindor to see me? I hate the girly-girl look, but he's a Gryffindor, he would like it, wouldn't he? AH! FORGET IT! I brushed my hair several times to make my hair lie in soft waves down my back and stood back in front of the mirror, I liked my look and this school uniform wasn't as scratchy as I had expected… it wasn't comfy, but still.

I was wearing medium-heeled shoes with semi-opaque black tights leading up to a black skirt with folds in it just above my knees. Together they made my legs look a lot thinner and slender than they would've been usually. The skirt finished at a green and silver hem of a black jumper which fell softly over my body but never showed any of my figure at all. All of this was topped off by a long sweeping black robe, lined with the signature jade green of my house. I spaced out my cloaks hood over my shoulders to display the green and fastened the cloak so it flowed easier and never tripped me up.

Finally happy with the style, as was the mirror, I left the dormitory while one of the other girls started to stir in her sleep. I headed straight for breakfast, wondering what they served in this school. I was starving since I hadn't eaten much last night.

As I found my way to the doors of the great hall I was stood on the stair case we had assembled on last night, there were several people gathered around the area, some with food in their hands some seemingly waiting for others and some were just talking. At the top of the staircase however were several people going into the hall, many of them were Gryffindor, and at the back of the group was the vision from the night before, with his look-a-like… from this angle I couldn't tell which it was I had seen the night before.

I went into the hall and sat down at the Slytherin table, the decorations had disappeared but there were napkins out with the Hogwarts' crest on them so we could take away food. There were only two people at the Slytherin table. I had no idea who they were so I sat down several metres away from them and watched the twins on the other side of the hall, wondering if I'd ever get a chance to talk to either of them and how different they'd be from each other if I ever did. I stared at them for quite a while, not realising just how obvious I was being, eventually one of them looked over, he was laughing like one of them were last night, I was certain it was the same one but I didn't think I'd ever know. I still never took my eye from the identical twins, seeing what they were doing but oblivious to the fact one of them had seen me. The one that had spotted me poked his companion in the ribs and as he looked towards him I came to my senses and blinked checking around the hall in case Pansy or anyone else had come in but they hadn't so as my eyes skimmed past the twins back to my still empty plate I noticed both of them were watching me, completely aware I had been staring. Forcing my eyes to stay down on the food as I selected something to eat I could feel them watching me, it was the same as before the sorting ceremony began. I felt like a child being told off by her parents but this was extra nerve-racking. I was hoping with all my heart that the other twin never believed the first and they thought no more on it.

After selecting some cereal I chanced a look up. To my surprise there were two people blocking my view of the Gryffindor table. My face burned as if it was on fire. It was Draco Malfoy and Blaise Zambini. Draco sat down opposite me with Blaise beside him. I saw the twins between their heads, the second twin was now watching our table while the one that had noticed me before was eating his breakfast. Neither looked impressed at me and the second twin soon looked away too.

'Seen Pansy?' Blaise asked me, I had already forgotten the boys were there, I looked at the two of them. Draco was pouring out some of the cereal I had already chosen but had his eyes fixed on me, Blaise had his eyes on the toast as he picked the lightest of the pieces.

'Uh… no' I told him quietly, Blaise looked up at me then straight down again at his toast. Draco however still hadn't taken his eyes off of me, I tried to hide my extreme feeling of awkwardness from him, and forced a small smile which he never returned, making me feel even more uncomfortable. Eventually he looked down at the cereal as he poured some milk into it.

'RONALD WEASLEY!' someone screamed suddenly from the other side of the room, I looked up at the Gryffindor table, Blaise and Draco turned on the bench to face them all too. A scarlet howler was hovering above the table a few seats along from the visions everyone had stopped everything, including the teachers, to watch. I hated watching Howlers, as I watched I remembered when I was six.

_My dad was looking through his owl mail, he had a whole load in one morning. I was just sitting on the couch talking to him I fell silent as I let him inspect the mail  
'bills, daily profit, free sample of buzz powder from Archi Langer in Scotland! - Want to test that out for me at school later kid?' I laughed my dad makes things for and works in zonko's joke shop and I adored being his test person. 'oh your blasted mother has written again! Throw it on the fire would you Ally?' I hopped off of the sofa and picked the letter up from the table, I took it towards the fire but stopped as I reached the end of the sofa. Had dad noticed it was burning on one corner? What was this thing? I studied the envelope slowly, suddenly the fire caught my fingers and I dropped it to the floor, luckily it never landed and so was fine… until it exploded in mid air and turned into a mouth shape.  
'JOHN PAIPER! I CANNOT BELIEVE YOU LEFT LIKE THAT! I WANT MY DAUGHTER BACK! BRING HER BACK RIGHT NOW! HOW DARE YOU TAKE HER AWAY FROM HER TWIN! THEY WILL LEARN TO GET ALONG IN TIME IF YOU JUST BRING HER BACK!' I fell to the __ground in shock of the screaming, the house seemed to be shaking so I pulled my legs up to my chin and hid between the sofa and the back wall, the letter kept shouting at my dad as I tried to drown out the sound, occasionally successfully but I was shaking from head to toe. Soon the letter ripped up and fluttered to the floor. My dad came over and hugged me  
'I don't want to go back to her, or Scary! Please don't make me go back' I begged him 'what was that thing?' He told me that it was a well disguised howler and apologised several times, I never wanted to see one of those things again._

I had missed what this howler had said in my memory but it began to tear itself up roughly and fell to the table as I had seen only once before. Draco Malfoy was laughing at the boys it had yelled at, another ginger boy who was now quivering as was I. I couldn't see anyone else and I watched this boy having the same reaction as I did. Soon everybody calmed down and the two boys opposite me turned back around to me and began talking friendly.

I sat in silence as the boys started to talk, I kept staring at my meal not wanting to look up at the twins on the other side of the hall in case Draco thought I was staring at him. About five minutes after the boys had joined me someone sat down beside me, I looked up to see Pansy sitting beside me. I greeted her with a smile and a quiet hello. The boys were clearly not listening to our conversation as she asked:

'you hung around with these two?'

'they sat here when they came in, I've not really talked to them or anything'

'oh… okay' she smiled 'so how are you?'

'good' I told her 'you?'

'yeah, I'm alright thanks.' she said 'so got any good roommates?'

'they're all too chatty' I said 'but they're alright I suppose'

She nodded in a way that said she understood rather than that she agreed. 'can I ask you a question?' I asked her very quietly. She looked at me with a confused expression, 'about Draco…' I told her

'okay' she said slowly still looking very confused at me. I checked that the boys weren't listen but to my surprise Blaise was sitting silently cutting up the toast which he had covered in baked-beans and Draco was watching me again moving his spoon slowly to his mouth from his bowl. He had obviously heard his name mentioned. His face wore an expression somewhere between offence, disappointment and questioning. My heart pinged slightly with guilt but either way I couldn't help but wonder why he cared what I had said, from what Pansy had told me I never thought he'd care about what anyone would think. 'actually, I'll talk to you later' I told Pansy not taking my eyes off of Draco. 'who do I need to get my timetable off of?'

'Snape' she said, I looked at her 'dark hair, he's the our head of house, right there' she pointed out a greasy haired, large nosed teacher at the front of the hall he was in a conversation with another teacher but I headed up towards him anyway, saying goodbye to Pansy and the boys as I left the table. I walked down the length of the table until I reached the front table, Snape stopped talking immediately and looked down at me. I swallowed slightly fearfully.

'uh… can I have my timetable please?' I asked timidly

'name?' he asked sounding friendly but powerful at the same time

'Alyce Harmony Paiper' I told him,

'you're the one with the twin in Gryffindor?' he asked me as he began to search through a few rolls of parchment

'yes sir' I told him, I turned quickly around as his eyes had looked towards the Gryffindor table and noticed Scarlett sitting at the table, I hadn't seen her come in, she already had an identical roll of parchment in her hand and she was just finishing her breakfast. I turned back to the teacher in front of me, he had his eyes fixed on the parchments in his hand, suddenly he pulled one away from the rest and handed it to me.

'you have me first, along the passage from the common room ask an older student if you need help finding any classrooms, lateness will not be tolerated in Hogwarts'

'yes sir' I said and left the table. I walked directly to the door at a quick pace trying not to make eye-contact with anyone as I passed. As I got outside I stood to one side of the door and unrolled the parchment I had been given, it said I had potions with the Gryffindors, then Transfiguration with the Ravenclaws, Flying with the Gryffindors, History of magic with the Hufflepuffs and defence against the dark arts with Gryffindor. Fantastic - not!, I'm with the Gryffindor three times in one day - every week! Someone barged past me making me drop my timetable. I ducked down and picked it up immediately then looking up I saw (not-so-)Scary-Scarlett walking away from me looking over at her shoulder and laughing at me.

'hey S' I said falsely friendlily, almost sarcastically. I caught up to her and stood in front of her 'what the hell is up with you?' I said now sounding angry like I felt

'Oh great! It's _**you**_! Nothing! Just looking at my timetable and saw that three out of my five lessons are shared with your stupid house!' she told me patronisingly

'Oh yeah me too! Looking forward to looking foolish?' I asked her 'Where's your little ginger friend? Crying in the corner somewhere?'

'Me? Stupid? Yeah right! Says you who can't even hold her timetable properly and its none of your business where Ginny is!' she retorted back at me

'Oh yeah says you! Enjoy that Howler in there did you? Bring back some happy memories for you?' I asked her

'Huh? What are you talking about? For your information no I didn't enjoy it... Harry and Ron could have been seriously hurt; ahh yes but of course you wouldn't care about them now would you you've got Draco Malfoy with you - please keep away from him I've heard he's dangerous!' she shouted, obviously not really caring,

'Hurt? It's a silly little piece of paper! The most it could've done was hurt their little red ears! And Draco is NOT 'dangerous'! Who told you that?' I yelled back disbelievingly

'NOT THE HOWLER YOU STUPID GIRL! THE ENTIRE INCIDENT THE HOWLER WAS SENT FOR!'

'OH YEAH RIGHT LIKE YOU CARE ABOUT THEM REALLY! Unless you loooove them... oh of course you do... I forgot... you like anyone who's small and breaks the rules, don't you?' I told her angrily

'SMALL? They're the year above us!' she yelled at me, she flapped her arms like a bird, what an idiot!

'OH YEAH HE LOOKED SO TOUGH COWERING PRACTICALLY **UNDER** THE TABLE!' I told her holding back a laugh

'For crying out loud! THEY FLEW A CAR TO SCHOOL!' she yelled at me, that just _**HAD**_ to be the worst lie ever!

'FLEW A CAR? WHAT HAVE YOU BEEN EATING? CARS DONT FLY!' I told her

'Are you deaf? The Howler just explained it ALL!' she carried on trying to win the argument

'WELL I'M NOT SO RUDE TO LISTEN TO OTHER PEOPLES MAIL!'

'IT'S A HOWLER! DRACO MADE THE EFFORT!' she yelled angrily, come to think of it: how _**did**_ she know about Draco?

'YOU STILL HAVEN'T TOLD ME WHO SAID HE'S DANGEROUS! AND I DON'T CARE WHAT DRACO DOES! JUST BECAUSE HE'S MY MATE DOESN'T MEAN I'LL DO EVERYTHING HE DOES! BECAUSE UNLIKE YOU I'M NOT A SHEEP!' I told her, guessing our mum wouldn't have taught her any sort of Muggle speech

'A SHEEP? WHAT THE?' she said, I was right!

'ARE YOU THICK?' I asked her patronisingly

'Ohh y'know all of Ginny's family!' she told me stupidly

'DRACO IS NOT DANGEROUS! I DON'T CARE WHAT THE GINGER CHIPMUNKS TOLD YOU! HE HAS FEELINGS LIKE EVERYONE ELSE!' I yelled at her… did I just say chipmunks?

'Riiiiight of course he does! His dad is a follower of you-know-who!' she retorted, getting desperate

'WHO CARES WHAT HIS DAD IS! HE'S NOTHING LIKE HIS DAD!' I told her, truthfully, I couldn't ever imagine his dad making the face he had made when I was about to ask about Pansy about him

'Wanna bet?' she asked stupidly

'NO I DON'T BET! I'VE BEEN RAISED BY A DECENT HUMAN BEING' I knew it was below the belt but I was fed up and needed to get my things, anyways I'd never forget mum's howler.

'DID YOU JUST SAY THAT MUMMY ISN'T HUMAN!' she screamed sounding like she was about to cry

'MUMMY? SERIOUSLY? GROW UP SCARLETT!' I asked her

'GROW UP? I _**AM**_ GROWN UP!' very unconvincing, Scarlett, very, very unconvincing.

'OH YEAH RIGHT! MUMMY IS SOMETHING A GROWN UP SAYS!' I told her laughing slightly

'JUST LEAVE ME ALONE!' she stormed off - at last! I had _**so**_ won that argument - well what did I expect? I always win against Scary-Scarlett. I walked back to the staircase towards the Slytherin common room to get some parchment and quills for the day.

_**(S.V.P)**_

I woke up from a rather fitful sleep (dreaming of both Harry and Ron had that drastic effect on me) whilst Ginny was crouching beside me I told her why I was such a fitful distress.

'Aww Scarlett! It's OK I promise both Harry and Ron are big boys and they can take care of themselves and just like the twins said last night they will be down at Breakfast and, knowing Ron anyway, scoffing all the food! So why don't I leave you to get up and dressed and I'll save you a seat at the table plus pick up your timetable for you?' She said whilst collecting all my clothes from my trunk at the bottom of my bed and placing them onto the bed. Then before she skipped out of the dorm she gave me a hug as soon as my feet touched the floor.

So after a few minutes of stretching all of my kinks out I threw my clothes on in a reasonable fashion and followed the same direction that I'd just seen Ginny go moments before.

'I do hope you're not planning to go down to Breakfast dressed like **THAT**!'

I spun round and nearly fell down the stone stairs as I took in who had just said that to me… The Fat Lady!

'Erm… Well you see the thing is… I really need to get downstairs to see whether my best friend's brother and his best friend have finally arrived at school yet… Could you not just let me go down to the Great Hall if I promise to come back up afterwards and straighten myself out?' I looked at her with pleading eyes…

'Are you referring to Mr's Potter and Weasley? Because if you are then I gave them the exact same lecture about an hour ago and let me tell you they still had to turn themselves around and get dressed! So off you go, chop, chop!'

'Ugh! Fine! I'm going!' with that I turned round and stormed back through the portrait hole and tucked my shirt in and made sure my tie with my house colours (red and gold diagonal stripes) was the correct way round and my tights weren't showing any wrinkles in them; as soon as I was satisfied with my appearance, the second time around, I walked straight back through the hole.

'Much better my dear!' The Fat Lady said to the back of my head as I rushed down the stairs to Breakfast.

'Where the heck have you been?' Ginny said whilst half strangling me into a hug 'look who arrived at 12:30AM this morning! I said they would be here didn't I?' it was only then that I realised who she was gesturing to!

'Ohmigosh! Harry and Ron? You made it? What happened to you?

I asked them with an astounded look on my face

'Well… Err… You see the thing is… we… umm… couldn't get through the barrier at King's cross so we… umm… took Ron's dads' car that he magically transformed to fly instead. But the invisibility booster broke halfway through our journey so we were… umm… seen by Muggles so we had to slow our journey up which meant that we **finally** arrived here at 12:30 just like Ginny told you, so yes that's our story! Why were you so late to Breakfast then?'

Once I had digested the story that Harry had finished telling me I told all three of them about what had happened between me and The Fat Lady. All three of them roared with laughter until we saw a bright red envelope making its way toward our little huddle and aiming straight for Ron's plate!

'Quick Scarlett! Follow me; Ron's just been sent a Howler & by the looks of things it won't be pretty!' Ginny said whilst half dragging me to the other end of the long house table; unfortunately we could still hear it from there. Mrs Weasley's voice boomed loud from the envelope that had magically transformed into a pair of lips:

'RONALD BILIUS WEASLEY!

HOW COULD YOU BE SO IRRESPOSIBLE? WHEN YOU KNEW FULL WELL THAT YOUR **ONLY** SISTER WAS JOINING HOGWARTS THIS YEAR? AND INVOLVING HARRY IN YOUR STUPID SCHEME TOO? I WOULD'VE EXPECTED THIS FROM FRED AND GEORGE NOT YOU! YOU MARK MY WORDS DEAR BOY I WILL DRAG YOU OUT OF HOGWARTS BY YOUR RED HAIR IF I HAVE TO! I'M GLAD THAT PROFESSOR DUMBLEDORE IS MAKING BOTH YOU AND HARRY HAVE DETENTION FOR THE NEXT MONTH; MAYBE NOW YOU WILL LEARN YOUR LESSON!

Ginny dear, your father and I are so proud that you got into Gryffindor ~ please don't follow in your older brother's footsteps I don't think I could stand the grief. Promise me Ginevra!'

As soon as the letter had finished the last word it crumpled into a burning heap and as the entire hall had gone into petrified silence you could have heard a potion vile drop. Ginny and I both scanned the hall to see who we would have to avoid for the next month and that was when I spotted him – the blonde haired boy from the feast last night – and he was cackling his head off and made mimicking gestures to our table! Unfortunately Ginny also happened to catch this and turned on her heel and ran off in the opposite direction, leaving me, and my timetable, and rest of the Gryffindors to try not to kill him!

'Who the heck is that idiot anyway?' I asked a very angry looking Fred

'That Scarlett would be Draco Malfoy! Try and stay out of his way at all costs otherwise we won't be responsible for our actions, got it?'

'Loud and clear' I said and with that I picked up my timetable, and walked towards the front entrance of the Great Hall, to see which lessons I had and found to my ultimate shock that first off I had Potions with Professor S. Snape and the Slytherins then after that I had Herbology with Professor P. Sprout and the Hufflepuffs after which was Break time. I scanned the rest of the timetable and saw to my horror that the third lesson was Flying with Madame R. Hooch and… the Slytherins! The fourth lesson was Charms with Professor F. Flitwick and Ravenclaw; my final lesson of the day was Defence Against the Dark Arts with Professor G. Lockhart and the Slytherins.

'Well that's just PERFECT isn't it?' I shouted to myself in the teaming hall just as I turned round I saw my twin whip her head round in my direction and she came sideling up to me and the conversation went something like this:

'Hey 'S'' that was said with an evil smirk all over her face… 'What the hell are you doing?' Her cheeks were getting redder and redder.

'Oh great! It's **you**! Nothing! Just looking at my timetable and saw that three out of my five lessons are shared with your stupid house!' I joined her with the red face – gahh she made me so mad!

'Oh yeah me too! Looking forward to looking foolish?' She said with a massive smile plastered from ear to ear. 'Where's your little ginger friend? Crying in the corner somewhere?'

'Me? Stupid? Yeah right! Says you who can't even hold her timetable properly and its none of your business where Ginny is!' I retorted back at her.

'Oh yeah says you! Enjoy that Howler in there did you? Bring back some happy memories for you?'

'Huh? What are you talking about? For your information no I didn't enjoy it... Harry and Ron could have been seriously hurt; ahh yes but of course you wouldn't care about them now would you you've got Draco Malfoy with you - please keep away from him I've heard he's dangerous!' I replied at her, see how much of an effort I was making to try and protect her?

'Hurt? It's a silly little piece of paper! The most it could've done was hurt their little red ears! And Draco is NOT 'dangerous'! Who told you that?'

'NOT THE HOWLER YOU STUPID GIRL! THE ENTITRE INCIDENT THE HOWLER WAS SENT FOR' I practically snarled at her – it felt good!

'OH YEAH RIGHT LIKE YOU CARE ABOUT THEM REALLY! Unless you loooove them... oh of course you do... I forgot... you like anyone who's small and breaks the rules, don't you?' She shot back at me

'SMALL? They're the year above us!' I screamed at her whilst madly waving my arms about to make my point…

'OH YEAH HE LOOKED SO TOUGH COWERING PRACTICALLY **UNDER** THE TABLE!' She spat back at me – great this wasn't go as well I'd planned…

'For crying out loud! THEY FLEW A CAR TO SCHOOL!' I thought this was the best approach to my twin; spell out the obvious maybe she might leave me alone in a few minutes…

'FLEW A CAR? WHAT HAVE YOU BEEN EATING? CARS DON'T FLY!' She shouted sounding surprised.

OK so no such luck then…

'Are you deaf? The Howler just explained it ALL!' I continued on trying to save **some** face…

'WELL I'M NOT SO RUDE TO LISTEN TO OTHER PEOPLES MAIL!'

Oh she was really trying my patience now!

'IT'S A HOWLER! DRACO MADE THE EFFORT!' I screamed at her

'YOU STILL HAVEN'T TOLD ME WHO SAID HE'S DANGEROUS! AND I DON'T CARE WHAT DRACO DOES! JUST BECAUSE HE'S MY MATE DOESN'T MEAN I'LL DO EVERYTHING HE DOES! BECAUSE UNLIKE YOU I'M NOT A SHEEP!'

'A SHEEP? WHAT THE?'

'ARE YOU THICK?'

Wow her arguments were getting worse…

'Ohh y'know all of Ginny's family!' I smirked at her; she wouldn't be able to retort to that surely…

'DRACO IS NOT DANGEROUS! I DON'T CARE WHAT THE GINGER CHIPMUNKS TOLD YOU! HE HAS FEELINGS LIKE EVERYONE ELSE!'

'Riiiiight of course he does! His dad is a follower of you-know-who!'

'WHO CARES WHAT HIS DAD IS! HE'S NOTHING LIKE HIS DAD!'

'Wanna bet?' I said with a glint in my eye

'NO I DON'T BET! I'VE BEEN RAISED BY A DECENT HUMAN BEING'

Ohh that was **IT**!

'DID YOU JUST SAY THAT MUMMY ISN'T HUMAN!'

'MUMMY? SERIOUSLY? GROW UP SCARLETT!'

'GROW UP? I **AM** GROWN UP!'

'OH YEAH RIGHT! MUMMY IS SOMETHING A GROWN UP SAYS!'

'JUST LEAVE ME ALONE!'

With the last insult ringing in my ears I stormed off to the other side of the hallway and found a nice quiet step to sit on and with that I burst into quiet sobs – why oh why does she always have that effect on me?


	4. Lessons quickly learned

_**(S.V.P)**_

Finally the door to the Potions class opened and a man with greasy black hair that fell about his head like curtains who ushered us in silently and once we had all found our places he walked in to the classroom, cloak billowing, and the door swung shut behind him. As he was walking down the right hand side of the desks he said in a serious fashion,

'There will be no foolish wand-waving or silly incantations in this class!'

I turned to Ginny and said in hushed tones 'well if that doesn't make me realise what the rest of this years Potions lessons are going to be like, nothing will!' After that we burst into fits of giggles!

'Scarlett! You're **so** funny! And I live with Fred and George…'

We were stopped abruptly by the fact that nobody else was laughing instead they were facing the front looking at the teacher; who, incidentally, was looking down his long hooked nose at us.

'Ahh I see that Miss Weasley and Miss Paiper are enjoying themselves a little too much, tell me Miss Weasley: is it genetic for the **youngest** members of your family to break the rules?'

'NO NOT REALLY! WE JUST ALL HAPPEN TO DISLIKE YOU!' She shouted at him from our middle row.

After that outburst I happened to catch my sister and another boy out of the corner of my eye who looked as if they were about to jump out of their seats and kill her – yikes!

'Well, well, well lets see shall we? Ahh yes why don't I take 30 points from Miss Weasley for shouting out and disrespecting me in my own lesson, from Miss Paiper I'm going to deduct 10 points for causing disruptions at the beginning of my class! Ohh dear girls looks like Mr's Potter and Weasley's little "incident" and 40 points, each, deduction has put Gryffindor into minus points on the first full day back ~ I do hope you're pleased with yourselves!'

'SEE! THIS IS WHY WE **HATE** YOU!' Ginny screamed back at him… Under her breath…

'Ginny! Shush! How many more points do you want us to loose? Just stay quiet until the end of the lesson and then maybe we can go and find Fred and George, yes? For me?' I was really begging her, but I just didn't want Alyce to have the satisfaction over me of being the better student, twin, whatever she thought she was!

'Okay I promise, for you and the reputation of Gryffindor, I will keep my thoughts and feelings to myself.' She hissed at me, so as we didn't get caught again.

'Thank you' I smiled at her – finally one battle today that I **had** won!

With that we got on with the rest of the Potions lesson, just waiting until we could accost Fred, George, Ron or even Harry and tell them how disgraceful, and disgusting, a teacher Snape really was!

As soon as Snape dismissed us we leapt out of our chairs and, consulting our timetables and luckily a prefect, we made it to Greenhouse number 3 with five minutes to spare! Once the rest of the class had arrived a stout women came out from the Greenhouse door and ushered us in – this teacher was a heck of a lot nicer then Professor Snape – she then went ahead to tell us the structure of the hour lesson we had in front of us; I could really see myself mastering this subject! Once we were let lose onto the plants in question something, or to be more precise someone, caught my eye as the greenhouse we were in was **so** close to the flying pitch that we could almost smell the wood from the brooms! I finally bought myself to turn my whole head to the pitch and saw that both Harry and Ron were flying high above the trees on brooms; my thoughts quickly turned from the plant pot in front of me to Harry biting my lip I went into one of my, normal, day-dream states…

_Wow Ginny is so lucky to be close to a guy like him; is it really wrong that I have a soft spot for him too? I mean, Scarlett, just look at him! The hair, the eyes, the smile… Gosh I'm a sucker for a smile… But I guess I'll always have to let Ginny have him – after all her brother **is** his best mate… Hey! That gives me a very good idea! Scarlett Victoria Paiper you are a genius!_

I quickly came back into reality because I felt Ginny poking me and Professor Sprout asking me why my plant pot was still the same as it had been 10 minutes ago ~ it can't have been that long surely? ~ once she had bustled off to the other students further away from us Ginny turned sharply towards me and asked me outright:

'So, which one of them have you been eyeing up then? Harry or Ron? I really hope for our friendship it's neither of them… But come on spit it out!'

'Erm… no one! I wasn't eying up any of the boys! I was just somewhere a little further away, that's all… I'm telling the truth OK?' I was of course lying, but if the 11 years of living with my mum has taught me anything it's this: as long as you don't blush or move your eyes to the left then you're safe!

'All right, I'll believe you.. For now!' Ginny replied and with that she helped me with my blasted plant pot and my lie was forgotten… After a moment or two of silence however, I couldn't help but let Ron slip into my mind. I knew perfectly well what Ginny had just said but she couldn't tell what I was thinking… Suddenly Professor Sprout was calling us all back to our senses, as the lesson had finished, and with that we packed up our things and left the greenhouse. As soon as I turned the corner to go back up to school I walked straight into someone…

'S-S-Sorry!' I stammered at them

'Hey there's no need to apologise! I do it all the time! Have you just had Herbology with Professor Sprout?' they said smiling down at me

'Yeah I have, why do you ask?' I replied chancing a look up at them… 'Ron?'

'Hey there Scarlett! How you finding your first day?' He said with a little smirk on his face

'It's going great thanks, yeah. Hey? Fancy a walk up to the common room?' I asked with a twinkle in my eye, this was going to be a breeze!

'Yeah sure! Why not? Coming Gin?' He said whilst looking over his shoulder at his sister

'No thanks, think I might head back and talk to Harry and leave you two love birds to it!' she said with an evil smirk on her face – no, no she cannot be turning into Alyce not now!

'Excuse me? What are you on about? Ginerva Weasley get back here this second! Sorry Scarlett I've got to give my sister a massive talking to! Be right back!' with that he ran off leaving me to look at the floor and contemplate what had just happened…

I really needed the loo so with that I left Ron to sort out his 'Ginny-problem' and went to the girls toilet, when I went back outside to see if Ron and Ginny had finally come to their senses I was met with a very big surprise… another girl was standing with her back to me, she had long bushy brown hair (that was singed very badly at the ends) and looked like she was bossing him around. So with that I sidled up to her to ask her what her problem was

'OI! What the heck do you think you're doing being mean to Ron like that?'

'I beg your pardon? If you don't mind I was talking to my best mate about something, so would you kindly clear off and talk to your Slytherin friends. Thanks!' She snarled at me

'M-M-My Slytherin friends? What are you on about? I'm in Gryffindor, like you, my twin on the other hand is a Sly…. OH no what has she done to you?'

'Seriously? You're in Gryffindor? Well in that case I apologise for being mean to you. Your sister decided it would be hilarious to try and transfigure my hair into a cat! Luckily for her, it completely backfired so all I'm left with is burnt hair…'

'I'm so sorry, let me make it up to you please?' I pleaded with her. Our flying lesson was going to be great!

'Aww you are kind, how's about you sit with Harry, Ron and myself at lunch, and Ginny of course, sound good?' She smiled back at me

'Yup that sounds perfect! Ron? You sorted things out with Ginny yet?' I asked shyly, not really wanting to know the answer…

'Scarlett, you have nothing to worry about! She was just messing around, everything is perfectly fine.' He returned my smile with grace

'Well that's wonderful news! Anyway I have to go get ready for my first ever flying lesson see you lot later, bye!' and with that I ran off up to the school to dump my books and get ready for lesson number three.

_**(A.H.P)**_

Someone was shaking me. I had laid down on the sofa in the common room after gathering my stuff for the day. I let my eyes flick open, I had fallen asleep! I must have been more tired than I had realised.

'Wake up!' said the person shaking me 'you'll be late for lessons.' I shot up into a sitting position, it was Blaise.

'thanks' I said 'where's Pansy and Draco?'

'already going to our lesson, I forgot my quill I just came back to pick it up, good job I did.'

'how long have I got to get to class?'

'not long, if you're lesson is close by you'll be okay but if it's not then you're done for.' he said

'I have potions' I told him. I got up and checked the nearest mirror if I looked okay, my hair was a bit of a mess but that's not too bad. I ran my fingers through it which flattened it slightly.

'oh that's easy you can get there in a few minutes' he told me 'one second, I'll just get my quill and I'll tell you where to go.' I nodded and he ran up the staircase towards the boys dormitories I followed him up the stairs a little bit.

'aren't _**you**_ going to be late for class?' I called to him

'it's okay, I know a short cut' he told me through the door, 'you can come in if you like.'

I pushed open the door and stood in the doorway looking around. Blaise was rummaging in his trunk at the end of his bed, Draco's bed was beside his and next to Draco's was Crabbe's and Goyle's beds. Blaise's bedside table was by far the most interesting, it had a model of his quidditch team hovering over the things on it, I couldn't see which team it was. There was a dismantled sneak-o-scope, a photograph of him and three other people, two of them I assumed was his parents, the other a quite a lot younger sister, an alarm clock, a pair of omnioculars, a comb embossed with the Slytherin snake, a mirror which looked strangely like a foe glass and a large, green spell book. The dullest of the bedsides was clearly a draw between Crabbe's and Goyle's as they had nothing on theirs at all. While Draco's had a jumble of items scattered over it, none of which were identifiable from this far away.

'Ah-ha there it is' Blaise said pulling a long blue peacock feathered quill from his trunk with some extra ink. He put them both in his bag and swung it onto his shoulder. He gestured me out of the door way and we left the common room together.

'right, go down that way' he said pointing to the passageway heading away from the great hall 'and then turn right on the last turning. If you hurry the class will still be outside, and you better hope they will be'

'thanks' I told him again and left to the direction he had pointed. He left to the other direction behind me. I found the class just where he had said, outside was a small sea of black cloaks with pieces of red and green on them and there without fail was my sister and her little ginger friend talking quietly against the wall nearby the door. Her friend was the first to spot me and alerted Scarlett of my presence. After Scarlett turned around especially to give me evils she turned back to her friend again who was also looking angrily at me. I didn't have a clue what Scarlett had told her but I didn't care, at all.

Just then Snape's classroom door opened slowly and he appeared in the door frame, I stood in line quickly and followed everybody inside. I sat with some of the Slytherin boys who were a lot less annoying than the girls as they seemed to enjoy talking about quidditch rather than their hairstyles. Though I still never joined in and much preferred just to work. I wont bore you with the details of the lesson but basically it was a mixture of bad evils from Scarlett, a potion that I made 'almost perfectly' according to Snape and the fact that Snape clearly preferred me to Scarlett, as he seemed to prefer all of the Slytherins to the Gryffindors.

Transfiguration wasn't quite so successful, we were supposed to be changing a light brown piece of wood to another colour. Transfiguration was never really 'my thing' but I did manage to make it lighter eventually and after that I managed to tinge it with a hint of yellow. Even if I was aiming to make it green, I got a 4 out of 10 for it. I had been asked to sit next to Luna Lovegood as there were no other seats, she seemed to have forgotten the train journey and constantly talked to me, it was good payback for saying her dad's magazine was rubbish but I thought I had paid for that on the train.

When break time finally arrived I felt a new sensation of coming back to life. As soon as I could I escaped from the classroom and the torment of Lovegood, I headed towards the common room. I reached the clock tower and headed towards the stairway when I saw him, I tried to avoid his eye and get away but he saw me.

'Alyce?' Draco called to me, I stopped and turned to face him forcing a smile to my face.

'hi'

'hey, where are you heading?' he asked me happily

'oh umm, I was going to drop my things off in my dorm' I told him

'okay, well after that do you want to hang out with the others and myself?' he asked.

'yeah, sure' I said, knowing that Pansy and Blaise would be there to.

'I'll come with you now' he told me,

'oh… okay' I said reluctantly, I read somewhere that boys can't get into the girls rooms at least, I hope that was true. He nodded me in the right direction and we continued to walk to the common room,

'so how's your first day going?' he asked me friendlily,

'uh… good I suppose, the lessons aren't too bad, the people are, but I can deal with them I suppose' I told him simply

'who's getting on your nerves?'

'oh well there's that Luna Lovegood girl, that I mentioned at the feast. I had to sit next to her in transfiguration. And what do you know about that ginger girl in Gryffindor? The one that's hangs around with my twin?' I asked

'Weaslette? not much about her, but all those other ginger ones are her elder brothers. They're bloodtraitors.' he said with a deep air of dislike, I decided not to ask exactly what they had done.

'well she shouted out at Snape earlier, she thinks she's funny or something, but she's really not'

'like the rest of them then' he said 'oh and look who it is' he stopped in his tracks and wrapped his hand around my arm, I stopped too and looked at how easily he had managed to fit his hand around my wrist,

'who?' I asked now looking around.

'you see that girl over there?' he asked taking his hand off of my wrist, 'the one with the frizzy brown hair?'

'yeah?'

'well she's one of their best mates, a mudblood called Granger'

'she's called Granger?' I asked laughing slightly

'that's her surname' he told me, of course I never thought of that,

'what is with the hair? It's like she's been dragged through a bush backwards' I laughed 'its like a bird's nest… ever wanted to put a bird in there? See if it makes itself a home?'

'someone tried that last year, they failed but it was still hilarious' Draco told me

'maybe a cat next time?' I laughed, Draco moved closer to me and whispered into my ear devilishly

'or maybe we could just turn it into a cat? If you don't want to get seen feel free to hide' it took me a moment to realise whether he was joking or not, but it was soon made clear as Draco mumbled a spell to his wand and it shot a purple flash of light at the back of the girl's head. It never quite worked, the girl's hair singed at the ends, Draco had faltered in his spell and caused it to go wrong.

The girl span around with an angry expression on her face, she set her eyes onto me. Suddenly I realised that I still had my wand by my side, and Draco had hidden his behind his back. Both of us were typically in hysterics. She span her back again and practically ran away in the opposite direction after casting us both evil looks. Draco and I soon slowed down our laughing, now in a much more friendly mood and continued towards the common room.

'so how's your day gone so far?' I asked him.

'well, charms was terrible, boring… and then we had a flying lesson with the Gryffindors, so you can guess how that went.' he said simply

'are you always so negative?' I laughed

'kind of,' he told me 'does that bother you?'

'nah, you're okay' I told him. We reached the common room and went inside. Draco waited at the bottom of the girls staircase as I went to drop off my potions and transfiguration books, moments later I joined Draco again.

'so where are the others?' I asked him,

'near the lake' he said, 'walk with me?' he asked jokingly while offering his arm in what I hoped was still a joking way. It's times like these I'm glad I'm known as a tomboy

'you're kidding right?' I asked him laughing and pushed past his arm 'I don't do that sort of thing' again I got away with it without hurting anyone's feelings, I think… he put his arm down and shrugged it off. We wandered towards the lake where we spotted Blaise, Pansy, Crabbe and Goyle. Blaise and Pansy were talking together while the other two seemed to be trying to whistle on strands of grass, Draco lead me over to the others. I sat down next to Pansy who greeted me with a nod and continued talking to Blaise. I was over heating in the sun already, I put my hands a distance behind me and leant back turning my face up at the sun and closing my eyes.

Soon I felt the heat effect me and turned back to face the water but as I opened my eyes I immediately felt somebody else's eyes on me, I didn't think twice to know who it was I looked at Draco, and as expected his eyes were on me, what was with him? He was cool a few minutes ago, now he seemed to have more fire in his eyes than he had done before. He was sitting in the same way as me with his arms outstretched behind him and his legs extended in front of him.

'you look a bit hot' Pansy told me, I hadn't realised she was watching us, how odd this must look…

'I'm overheating' I told her, now turning to face her.

'well take off your cloak or something' she told me,

'good idea' I said slowly, I stood up and removed my cloak followed by my jumper, then folding them up I sat back down in the same way I had before, Draco was still watching me. I didn't want to think about what Draco may have been thinking at that moment, but his expression hadn't changed at all. It was still a slight smirk with his eyes fixed directly on mine. I could feel the slight refreshing breeze moving my blouse now and so I was a lot more relaxed. Again I turned away from Draco, this time looking up at the sky; I caught a few words of Pansy's and Blaise's conversation,

'so who's going out now?' Blaise asked

'Shane Arturo and Meryl Antonia, they were talking about it in our dorm last night' Pansy told him

'which house?' Blaise continued

'Slytherin, they're in the 4th year now, they were the ones who told us the password to the common room at the beginning of the year'

'the blonde girl?' Blaise confirmed

'yeah, but honestly Blaise, is that all you noticed about her?' Pansy asked sounding slightly amused

'no… she… um… she had green eyes!' Blaise said as if he'd had a major revelation

'no, that was Alyce' Pansy told him laughing, I looked back down at them to see Blaise trying to look into my eyes too this time, I laughed slightly nervously.

'I'd say my eyes are more hazel but whatever' I told them lightly, I felt some sort of heat hitting my fingers of my left hand that wasn't there before and suddenly had one of Draco's fingers slipping between two of my outstretched fingers, he tried to link his finger with one of mine that weren't flat on the ground but I flicked my head around to face him, he had his smirk on as he winked at me again. I took my hand away, annoyed but his facial expression never changed. Pansy and Blaise continued their conversation

Soon Pansy spoke to us again.

'we have five minutes to lessons we better get a move on.' she told us, we all got our things together and headed up towards the castle.

'do you know where you're going for your flying lesson?' she asked me. I hadn't thought of that, I shook my head, 'I'm going to show Alyce where to go for flying' she told the guys 'go ahead, I'll catch you up' We separated ourselves, it seemed out of character and it was clear Pansy wanted to talk to me about something. I let her start the conversation.

'So what was it that you wanted to ask me about Draco at breakfast?' she asked, oh this was simple enough

'oh, uh, it might sound weird but why does he keep staring at me?' I asked, this was more embarrassing than I had expected,

'he does?' she asked, was it not _**obvious?**_

'yeah, he was doing it last night, and this morning and he's been doing it the whole time outside… he never done it when we were walking together, but he offered me his arm and he was touching my hand and he keeps winking at me'

'oh,' she said, she wasn't looking at me 'well it looks like you've become his next target'

'target?' I repeated, that didn't sound good.

'no, not anything bad… I mean, he likes you. He must do.' she said

'b-b-b-but I d-, no-one ever likes _**me**_!' I dismissed

'well he does, for sure. Outside both of your eyes were completely stuck together, is it just me or did you totally forget I was there?' she asked me 'and if _**that **_wasn't intentional, you're probably giving _**him**_ the wrong idea too'

'I don't want to do that, I don't like Draco - in that way… but how do I show him I don't like him?'

'tell him to stop' Pansy said simply

'Draco doesn't seem like the kind of guy who would listen' I told her

'he's not, but he'd know and he'd stop eventually. Probably. Or you could just ignore him, don't give him them _**meaningful**_ stares back' she told me slightly amused again

'I _**DO NOT **_give him _**that**_ kind of stare!' I told her sharply 'I give him _**evil**_ looks'

'you just stare! Eyes wide, no expression, how's he supposed to know you love him like that?' she joked, I shook my head, refusing to argue 'ah-ha no denial!' she laughed.

'are you _**kidding**_ me?' I asked 'never! Never ever ever ever ever ever'

'until next month' she continued for me

'NO! NEVER!' I said laughing, we walked laughing for a while.

Suddenly Pansy stopped walking, I looked ahead of us, a huge quidditch pitch stretched in front of us, I've dreamt of flying in one of these since I was 5 and dad first took me flying on his broom. He's been teaching me to play ever since he took me away from mum, again, on his broomstick. I grinned, I couldn't wait to get in the air, and dad's getting me a broomstick for a coming home present at the end of this year. I need to practise as much as possible.


	5. Lions or Snakes?

_**(A.H.P)**_

'when I blow my whistle I want you all to kick off from the ground, hover for a moment, then lean forward slightly and touch back down. Okay!' Madame hooch blew her whistle. I immediately kicked off from the ground I flew up a little higher than I had intended in my excitement, it was a windy day and the wind immediately whipped my hair out of my face. I grinned, it was fantastic. I had never been quite so high because I live in a slightly crowded muggle area and couldn't fly above the roofline of our small house, I was now flying level to the fourth floor, without my dad flying alongside me. I looked down, the rest of the class seemed to be a lot smaller from up here, most of them hovering a couple of metres off of the ground, some shakily, some were a bit more confident and were still slightly higher off of the ground, but I was the first person in my class to see Hogwarts in this way.

Some of my class were now returning to the ground below me, I took in my surroundings quickly and leant forward slightly, I was well practised and managed to glide smoothly to the ground, still grinning. A few of the Slytherins grinned back, and one of my dorm mates idiotically came to ask me what is was like up there, but we were interrupted by Madame Hooch as she called for everyone to get back into lines.

'the key to flying is control, before a quidditch game, or before a journey, you may be nervous or excited, but no matter where we are we have to maintain control so as not to draw attention from any muggles or unwanted spectators in the area' she began once we all arranged ourselves back into lines, she seemed to be aiming this mainly at me, I held back a laugh 'this time I want you all to kick off to the level of my broomstick on the whistle and hover on the same level before returning to the ground. She kicked off of the ground at a reasonable but slow speed, as soon as the kick stopped powering her flight she hovered her broom and took her hands off, she took hold of her whistle and whistled loudly without even quivering her broom. I kicked off of the ground again, this time pursuing mostly on the same level as the teacher and the rest of the class, Scarlett was dead level with me. I hadn't yet seen her fly, ever. She gave me a look which seemed to say 'show off' with a sweep of ginger hair her friend too joined us on the same level, cutting off our line of vision with each other by appearing between us.

'everybody back to the ground, we'll try a bit higher this time.' Madame Hooch told us all as most people had reached the target. We returned to the floor again, as Madame Hooch pulled up slightly 'okay!' she called to us 'this time push off a little harder, remember the force of last time to figure out how hard you should push off.' she advised, the whistle rang through our ears again. This time a lot fewer people managed to reach the target as they over and undershot. Everybody was sent back to either improve or practise to the same level until the whole class had all managed it several times in succession.

The rest of the lesson was mainly based on the principle of controlling the kick-off however as the end of the lesson approached we began to learn to fly forward. It was a patronisingly basic lesson but I took advantage of every opportunity to fly as high as I could go without being set another challenge. No matter how dull the lesson had been I was sad to see the end, no more flying - or at least for now.

My next lesson was History of Magic. I followed my dorm mates and the boys to one of the brighter corridors in the castle. The journey was an interesting one, in one corridor I slowed down as we made our way through the crowd, and coming the opposite way were the visions. I hope that the wind had swept my hair into a slightly more seductive style as they both let their eyes linger on me for a moment, one for longer than the other, I wondered if they had remembered breakfast as they saw me, but either way I couldn't take my eyes off of them. I walked directly into the Slytherin first year boy in front of me as I watched them walk away.

'sorry' I mumbled to him pulling myself together,

History of magic was a much duller lesson than flying. The teacher, as my friends had told me was a ghost, at the beginning of the lesson as we sat down he entered through the blackboard making most people jump, or scream from excitement. Personally I was one of the ones who got a little shock but overall felt unaffected. After this I managed to zone out fully and used the time to dream about flying and the Gryffindor visions, so it was a very interesting lesson overall. When I wasn't dreaming I occasionally took some brief but useless notes, I could already see myself failing this exam but if I ever managed to stay zoned in for the lesson, I'll catch up. With the dreams and people around Hogwarts one thing became clear to me was that although it could be said about lessons at Hogwarts that they could become very repetitive, they were sure to never be boring.

As lunch time started I was still packing away my things. I left the room and headed straight for the great hall, I was worn out from flying in particular and needed food. As I had to walk so far to the hall it was practically full as I arrived, I scanned the Slytherin table for seats separated from everyone else or for my friends. My friends were the first to be spotted, Draco, Blaise and Pansy were sitting as we had been that morning this time with Crabbe and Goyle a while down the table eating messily and quickly. I walked over, the only seat was again opposite Draco so I sat down there hoping he would move on from interfering with me as I had shown no - I repeat for pansy's sake _**NO**_ - love or like or _**anything**_ back at him. None of them looked at me as I sat down, I took some food from the centre of the table and scanned the full hall, I could tell which was the back of my twins head as it was the only gold in a sea of ginger, there seemed to be one more ginger child than usual, a lanky younger boy sitting opposite my sister and beside a boy with dark hair and glasses, I looked away again. Wait, did I just see what I thought I saw? I looked back to the table. Oh my gosh! It was Harry Potter! I was certain of it. I wanted to see to him closer up, talk to him if I could. I formed several plans in my head, I could wait until he's finished lunch and just happen to get up at the same time and be going the same way as him out of the hall, I could find something I need to tell one of the people over there and go over or finally, I could just wait around and hope to be able to talk to him one- oh my gosh! What was that on my leg?

Something seemed to be on my leg, like a spider, the feeling stopped but an itch remained. Eventually I gained the courage to put my hand under the table, hoping not to find a spider sitting there. I brushed my hand down my leg, and on my knee my fingers slid onto the annoyance, it hadn't been a spider, but something a lot more frightening, someone had their fingers on my knee. I never needed to look to realise who they belonged to. I still had my fingers on his, wondering how to react, he started to move his fingers trying to stroke my hand and in turn moving his hand further up my leg, I whipped my hand away then pushed his fingers off of my thigh and leant across the table

'just stop!' I whispered to him, 'I don't like you that way' he winked at me again pointlessly. I made a sound of disapproval and disbelief then turned my body including my legs towards Pansy and out of his reach. I went back to my lunch while considering how to best see Harry Potter. I could go to talk to Scarlett - but what could ever be so important I'd want to talk to _**her**_ but still it would validate the excuse. Maybe I could become his anonymous Slytherin pen pal? That's a stupid idea I might be a Slytherin but he wont be as cunning to hide it away and will probably spill the secret in a matter of hours if he wasn't so incredibly freaked out by it in the first place to care.

I looked back towards the Gryffindor table, Harry and his own ginger friend were standing up, too late to figure anything out now, they left the hall, now followed by Granger. I finished eating my lunch and joined in with the conversation that Pansy was having about quidditch.

'so are you going up for the quidditch trials this year?' Pansy asked Blaise

'yeah might as well' Blaise told her 'you?'

'nah I don't like flying that much.'

'you don't?' I asked unbelievably,

'I haven't quite got a head for heights, I'm guessing you enjoyed flying today then?' she asked me

'yeah, I love flying, I've been flying since I was five, but I've always had limits to how high I can go and never been allowed to fly alone. Dad's getting me a broom at the end of the year, did I mention that?'

'umm, no' Pansy answer giving the impression she didn't care, which never bothered me either. 'shall we go outside now?'

'sure' we all agreed, apart from Crabbe and Goyle who decided they wanted to keep eating, apparently that was usual for them.

We visited the lake where we had sat this morning,

'gross can't believe we sat there earlier' Draco said to Blaise in front of us,

'what's going on?' I asked, I looked around Blaise as I had been walking directly behind him, Harry Potter and his trio were sitting there, 'you don't like Harry I take it?' that was one way to talk to him out of the window, and now I had to be careful if I did.

'Oh Potter _**would **_be fine' Pansy told me 'if it weren't for his choice in company'

'bloodtraitor and muggle-born?' I asked remembering what Draco had said about the Weasley family and Granger earlier.

'yeah, do you know them or something?' she asked

'no, Draco told me about them earlier' I said,

'oh so he does talk to you occasionally then' she laughed at me.

'I never said he didn't!' I told her indignantly as Draco turned around ready to protest. We found a new space near the lake, immediately I removed my jumper, cloak and bag in the heat, and sat down beside Pansy.

About 5 minutes later Draco moved to sit beside me, after us both having been ignored again by Pansy and Blaise as they ventured into their own conversation.

'So you got that talk you wanted with Pansy about me then?' he asked, I felt myself blush slightly,

'yeah' I told him, hoping to look apologetic, he shrugged it off

'okay' he said 'so did she tell you anything bad about me? I hope she did' he grinned mischievously.

'h-ha-ha' I faked a laugh badly 'um, I need the loo, be back in a bit' so, leaving my stuff with Pansy, I began a trek up the hill to the school. As I reached the door of the castle I heard somebody calling for my twin, she must be nearby, I scanned the small crowd in front of me, just Ravenclaws,

'Scarlett!'

'Scarlett!' there were two voices were calling for her, if she was behind me and it was that urgent then surely they'd have caught up with her by now, what was going on?

Suddenly a hand gripped my shoulder. I jumped and looked at it, it was a large hand, by the looks of it male. There were three people I'd be happy if they'd mistaken me for my twin, -gross did I just say I'd be _**happy**_ to be mistaken as Scary-Scarlett? I turned around and almost felt faint, but I held onto the door. I couldn't believe my luck, both of the visions were standing in front of me, grinning. Each of the grins however faded from view as their eyes scanned to my green and silver tie, I was considering talking first so I wouldn't make them leave too quickly, but I knew if I did my speech would slur and I would forever be regretting it.

'Sorry' one of them said, 'we thought you were-' he faded off, I nodded to him and gained the courage to talk

'Scarlett-yeah I realised, it's okay, it's an easy mistake' I told them, what a horrible fact to have to tell.

'you were the one staring at Fred at breakfast weren't you?' the other twin said poking the one called Fred in the ribs, I knew my face had just went a deep shade of red - maybe even purple, it felt like my head was about to explode. The twin that wasn't Fred started laughing again. Oh wow I love it when these two laugh…

'shut up George' Fred said, okay so I now knew both of their names, this was almost a friendly conversation, had it not been for the idea that I was stopping myself from being sick all over them with nerves and embarrassment.

'I didn't mean to' I lied 'sorry if I um, made you uncomfortable'

'nah it's okay' Fred told me shrugging it off, okay I _**had**_ to tell them my name somehow, I just _**had**_ to.

'I'm Alyce,' I told them, deciding suddenly not to use my full name 'with a Y' _**why**_ did they need to know that? I'm a complete idiot!

'Fred' Fred said simply 'with an F' he joked

'and I'm George' George added, over his shoulder I saw Scarlett approaching, now even more aware of my red face I knew I had to get out of there before she saw me close up

'anyways, I have to go, nice talking to you' I told them, even myself not knowing just how true it was as I balanced between the thrill of talking to two gorgeous guys and feeling incredibly ill.

'bye' they chorused, both smiling again. Oh don't do that, unless you really want me to pass out. I turned away and retreated indoors clumsily. I escaped quickly to the nearest girls bathrooms, leaning over one of the sinks so I could calm down.

_**(S.V.P)**_

As soon as I approached the flying pitch I saw Ginny waving at me and pointing at the spot that she'd very kindly saved for me, I'll have to have a quiet word with her later about why she was so mean to me when I was talking to Ron, so I walked over to her gave her side hug and waited for the rest of the class to arrive. This didn't seem to take too long and of course I just happened to catch my twin's eye and as usual she had a smirk plastered all over her face (joy of joys! I had totally forgotten that Daddy had been training her in mastering the flying skill since we were five ~ he gave up with me after one shot, I hate heights and Daddy and Alyce always bonded better so I wasn't **too** bothered…) suddenly a woman with grey spiky bobbed hair walked down to us with a broomstick in her hand and a whistle in the other; I guessed that this was Madame Hooch. When she reached us she introduced, I was right about who she was, and what she aimed to get out of us at the end of the lesson!

I saw Alyce smirk evilly at me – great I had to endure this for the next hour? Why, Merlin, why me?

'Damn it Ginny! Before we know it she'll be Quidditch captain for Slytherin, just look at her!' I sighed to my best mate whilst leaning on the brooms that obviously belonged to the school, as first years aren't allowed their own brooms yet…

'Scarlett don't worry about that, hey first years aren't even allowed onto the Quidditch team; apart from Ha…'

'Harry! Yes I know that! I **do** read the Daily Prophet y'know! Did you know that my mum interviewed him for the article in Teen witch weekly? Beat that HA!' I replied with a twinkle in my eye – this was the only way to play this…

'Ohmigosh! Why didn't you tell meeee? Did he come to your house and like sit in your chairs and drink from your tea cups?' She hyperventilated at me!

'WHOA Ginny! Calm yourself! It's only Harry Potter! If you really want to know what happened, then why can't you ask him yourself? I wasn't even allowed in the same room as him! My mum has weird views of famous witches and wizards… don't ask!' I replied whilst trying to calm her breathing down

'B-B-But I can't ask him! Every time I go near him I clam up, please Scarlett just tell me!' She begged me

'No, Ginny I can't 'cause I don't know anything about what happened. Anyway I think we'd better listen to Madame Hooch, don't you?' that was the final word on the Harry subject – I had fears to face and people to beat!

Once we had had our instructions on what Madame Hooch wanted us to do, this was after she had had to practically yank my sister out of the air, and just like that we all kicked off from the ground and were soaring just above Madame Hooch's broomstick (this was the guide that she had given us to make sure we didn't do ourselves or the brooms any damage). Soon enough the lesson was over and we packed our things up and raced the full length of the pitch to our next lesson; which was Charms!

We were all assembled at desks and a very small teacher all but leaped onto the pile of books that were cluttering his desk! He introduced himself as Professor Flitwick; he then set us the task of levitating feathers in the air – this was one subject that I was going to excel at unlike my sister, she'd be too far up in the air flying to concentrate on the more academic skills that Hogwarts has to offer! After we had spent half of the lesson working on "Wingardiem Leviosa" he spent the last half of the lesson giving us the essay homework, which was:

"How significant was the cheering charm in defeating the evil warlocks of Rondletown against the goblins of Tunkerstundpip?" He squeaked at us from the pile of books. The entire class groaned and then just like that we were dismissed and now I could start to enjoy my day – my "lunch date" with Ron was fast approaching after all! – Ginny and me raced up the stairs to the dorm and dumped our stuff onto our beds and then skipped down the stairs for lunch; and sure enough standing there beaming at us was none other then the angel who was Ron Weasley!

'OI! You two! Over here I saved you seats! The food is scrummy! What're you waiting for?' He all but yelled at us from just a few feet away from us; me and Ginny rolled our eyes in response and skipped down to the Gryffindor table and sat down in our seats and tucked in to the lovely, OK so maybe Ron was right, food… Suddenly the girl with bushy brown hair came and sat down in the middle of me and Ginny and promptly introduced herself as Hermione Granger; she then asked me for my name; Ron very nicely answered for me, I found her just a tad intimidating,

'Herskjgshgkjs namesugigkf Scasldgakfhaf!' this was all said with part of a chicken leg in his mouth so of course the entire group around us looked puzzled, which meant that I had to repeat my name to them!

'Erm, yeah it's Scarlett. Lovely to meet you a second time around! How's the hair?' I gingerly smiled at her, which she returned with good grace

'The hair's fine thank you for asking. Now tell me, Scarlett, what lessons have you had so far today & which of them have you enjoyed?'

'Well… So far I have had Potions with Professor Snape; Herbology with Professor Sprout; Flying with Madame Hooch and I've just come from Charms with Professor Flitwick! I've enjoyed Charms the most if I'm honest'

'Ahh yes, same with me. I absolutely love Charms! Just ask Ronald, preferably when he isn't eating, or Harry! Ginny, what about you? What lessons, so far, have you enjoyed?' Hermione said turning her head to her left.

'Hey 'Mione. Well I absolutely adore flying! But I'm sure that's got everything to do with having Quidditch-obsessed brothers, right?' She said whilst giving me the most snobbish look known to wizard-kind! How many more times would I have to tell her the same thing over and over again today?

After all the house tables had been cleared of food we were able to enjoy our lunch break; which meant that us five went down to the lake to chat some more and enjoy the lovely weather that had been bestowed on us I happened to glance over to the other side of us and saw Alyce and her little friends laughing and enjoying themselves, a little bit **too** much in my opinion, it was then that I realised that my sister was getting up to leave and then I saw that there was a space near the blonde prince that was Draco Malfoy so just like that I made some excuse to my fellow Gryffindors and snuck across to the Slytherins and tapped Draco on the shoulder and as he whipped his head round to see who had 'dared to tap on him the shoulder!' (His words not mine) I grinned at him, hehe this was soooo easy!

'Hey there sexy! Mind if I join you? Seeing as you look ever so lonely all by yourself…' I pouted at him

'Wow, and there was me thinking that your sister was the fit one! Take a seat down here good looking!' He smirked at me, nice smile as well!

Scarlett Victoria Paiper your "mummy's girl" image is slowly fading! So with that I parked myself down next to him – I also happened to notice that we had moved a little further away from the other two Slytherins…

'I notice you hang around with the freaks of Gryffindor, why do that? I mean hey you and your sister could totally switch places for the day and nobody would be any the wiser!' After he had finished saying that he raised both his eyebrows – wow I think I may be in love…

'Well that sounds like a great idea all in all but you see me and Alyce hardly see eye-to-eye on **anything** and I mean you may think that my friends are the "freaks of Gryffindor" but I disagree with you totally 'cause Ginny happens to be my best friend; so yeah can you just not be mean about them, please?' I pleaded with him.

Unfortunately he was having none of it:

'I'm Draco Malfoy! I don't play nice! Especially where Potty, Mudblood and the Weasels are concerned; please leave NOW before I do something that I'm not likely to regret but will give your little friends something to moan about!'

'Fine be like that then! There was I thinking that you could actually change if a pretty enough girl came along, seems not!' And like that I got up and stormed off back to my friends when the sight of Alyce talking to Fred and George made me so mad I raced over to them; surprise, surprise she ran away! What a scaredy cat!

'Hey guys' I smiled at them. 'What did my sister want? I hope she wasn't trying to turn you into a bottle of fire whisky!' Once I'd cracked the joke we all burst into fits of giggles

'Haha! Scarlett you're on fire today, Ginny told us all about Potions, and there was us thinking **we** were the funny ones!' They said whilst wiping their eyes after laughing so hard – I wasn't that funny was I? 'No, it was our fault mainly we got her confused with you; the poor girl was going very pink though, know anything about that?' This was said with the twins high-fiving each other – wow they were a bit odd sometimes…

'We-ell being a girl and knowing that certain people have that effect on me then, boys, I'd say she has a little bit of a crush on one, if not both, of you! Ohh I feel really sorry for you.' I was stifling a giggle at this point 'cause the looks on both of their faces was such a picture!

'Ahh would you look at the time! I have to go and get my stuff for Defence Against the Dark Arts, see you two at Dinner! Bye! Ginny? You coming or what?' I yelled as I ran up to the school to collect my books – yay another lesson to endure with Alyce could this day get any worse?

Once we had got all of the necessary books for the last lesson of the day Ginny and I went downstairs to the assembled throng of students, well to be totally honest Ginny skipped down the stairs – she fancies Professor Lockhart y'see, as soon as the door opened I felt my stomach turn, the Professor was GROSS!

'Bad choice Ginny, very bad choice! At least with Harry I can see the attraction; Professor Lockhart on the other hand? No flippin' way!' I whispered at her as we all filed into the classroom

'Oh shush you would you? He's really famous and he's teaching at Hogwarts! I mean I thought you'd know all about him seeing how your mum writes for Witch-Weekly after all…'

'Yes, but like I told you in Flying she won't let me associate with them. Now this time can we listen to this lesson. I want this to be over as quickly as possible!' I retorted back at her and then droned out from both her and the lesson; yet I still managed to take notes! Guess mum's genes really are rubbing off on me after all!

After we had endured an hour of Professor Lockhart droning on and on we were dismissed and both Ginny and I dumped our books in our dorm and went down to dinner; finally I could relax with my friends without my sister interfering. The night was looking a lot better then the day had been!


	6. Feelings and Friends

_**(S.V.P)**_

I woke up the next morning with a feeling of happiness in my stomach; I wasn't going to see my sister until third lesson! I checked my watch that was lying on my bedside table – dammit! I'd missed breakfast – so just like a Nimbus 2001 I jumped out of bed got dressed, taking extra care to not upset the Fat Lady, and collected together my books for my first two lessons (History of Magic and Herbology) then raced down the stairs and ran chest first into the dreamy girl who had been sorted into Ravenclaw at the feast two days ago. I stopped abruptly and we stood facing each other and then I said

'I'm so sorry for just running into you like that, it's just that I've missed breakfast and I don't really want to be late for my first ever lesson of History of Magic. I'm Scarlett Paiper, from Gryffindor, by the way. What's your name?'

'Hello there, my name is Luna Lovegood. The Nargles and I would like to tell you that you missed a wonderful breakfast spread this morning, pity really… Did you say that your first lesson is History of Magic? Because if it is then you're having it having it with my house. Fancy walking there together?'

'Err, yeah sure. Luna? Did you just say "Nargles" what exactly are they?'

'Well lets get walking then shall we? Oh look here comes Ginny shall we go?'

I was just about to open my mouth and re-ask her about the Nargles when Ginny whispered something to make me clamp it shut,

'If you're planning on asking her about the "Nargles" I really wouldn't bother she always changes the subject; all four of us tried over breakfast and she wouldn't budge. My advice is to drop it. Here I got you some breakfast I thought I'd let you sleep in after the state you were in yesterday morning, enjoy! Like Luna said lets go; seeing as you've made the effort to actually try and get to the lesson on time!' She said whilst grabbing my wrist and pulling me through the crowds.

We arrived outside the classroom to find people already filing inside so we followed them and so us three sat down at the back and took out our textbooks and get ready to begin the lesson; suddenly I let out an almighty scream!

'Oh My God! When did the Professors around here start coming into the classrooms through blackboards?' I was convinced that I'd deafened both Ginny and Luna; but they both seemed to be completely oblivious to my exclamation so answered with due grace:

'Haha, Scarlett! That's Professor Binns! How can your mum not have told you about him? He's been here for like 100 years or something; he never notices weather we're actually concentrating or not. This is the only lesson Fred, George, Harry and Ron never listen in. Who thinks we should follow suite?' She asked us with a mad glint in her eye, this is one of the many reasons she was my best mate she always had the best looks in her eyes, so I turned to her and said

'I guess my mum never mentioned him because before I got here I really wasn't that interested in anything to do with Hogwarts, please don't quiz me on why it was a bad few years for us, so she just told me about how to get onto the platform and that was it really. But yes let's take heed of your brothers, and Harry's, silliness in this lesson. I mean lets be fair I really need to get to know Luna better, don't I?' I turned to my left and smiled at Luna who seemed to not really be concentrating on anything that's going on between me and Gin or the lesson itself!

'Sorry Scarlett did you say something? I was just checking your ears for wrackspurts and let me tell both of you that your heads are full of them! No wonder you can't concentrate in lessons!'

Wow was this girl SERIOUS?

I turned to look at Ginny with enlarged eyes and she nodded back in agreement; maybe trying to be friends with her was a bad idea…

Eventually the lesson drew to a close and the Professor was **still** droning on so we all left the room quietly. Once we got outside Ginny and I hugged Luna goodbye and joined the throng of students heading outside to the greenhouses we all filed inside to see Professor Sprout's beaming face; she promptly got around to tell us that she wanted us to tend to the plants from yesterday and she looked at me rather sternly, luckily for her the second year Gryffindors were not on the flying pitch so there was to be no distraction for me today, we set to work quick smart and before we knew it the lesson had ended!

Ginny and I raced up to our dorm to dump all our books and pick up the ones we needed for DADA and Potions and then ran back down the stairs to find Neville standing at the bottom looking a tad confused…

'Hey Neville! Are you OK? You look a little lost…' Ginny asked him gently

'Ohh hey Ginny. I can't remember the password to get into Gryffindor Tower and if I don't get my books now Professor Snape will set the whole class extra homework!' He half sobbed in reply

'Aww Neville! It's OK.' I smiled down at him 'the password is wattlebird'

'thank you so much! Forgive me but I've totally forgotten your name, and I only met you at the feast two nights ago!' He said whilst shaking with confusion

'It's Scarlett Paiper. Don't worry about it I'm surprised that you second years want to talk to us, let alone hang out with us. Ginny before you say anything you don't have a choice your mum **made** your brothers hang out with you!' I turned round to say this to Ginny so that she could see that I wasn't pulling any punches – her face!

'Well now that Scarlett's completed insulted me and my whole family I'm going off to find Luna!' she said this with laughter in her eyes; see I knew there was a reason I had to look at her when I said it!

So with that we said goodbye to Neville and went outside to search for Luna, we eventually found her sitting under a tree looking out across the lake so we joined her

'Hey Luna! How was your second lesson?' I asked her after I'd sat down on her right.

'Oh hello you two. My second lesson was fine thank you. It was Transfiguration with the Slytherins. What about you two?' She asked with a far-off look in her eyes

'That's good to know. We've just come back from Herbology with the Hufflepuffs. Sounds like your lesson was murderous! Err, Luna, how was my sister?'

'Alyce you mean? Ohh she was fine. I must tell you she isn't very good at Transfiguration at all; also I must apologise for what I said to you two in History of Magic this morning, her head is teaming with Wrackspurts; yours on the other hand? Well I can only see a handful, so be happy with that!'

Ginny and me exchanged silent giggles but still sat with Luna chatting and laughing until break was over and both Ginny and I had to endure both DADA **and** Potions with the Slytherins and my sister! So we got up and walked up to the castle to DADA; as usual Ginny was concentrating on Professor Lockhart more then the actual lesson so of course I had to keep poking her in the ribs whenever my sister caught her drifting off and therefore took the liberty of making faces at us! Once the torture of third lesson was finally over we all trudged along to the dungeons for Potions to endure more of Professor Snape and his greasy hair and abnormally large nose; just as I was about to turn the corner I spied the eyebrow sex god of the western hemisphere, also know as Draco Malfoy, so I flattened myself against the wall breathing very slowly then once I had composed myself I walked out from behind the wall and gave him my most amazing smile – which he returned with a wink! – After I had stopped myself from fainting right onto the dungeon floor I walked into Potions to tell Ginny all about what had just happened:

'Ohmigosh! Draco just smiled and winked at me! He is soooo amazing! I mean don't get me wrong Harry and Ron are cool too but how many times have you seen them smile or wink at anybody, hmm?'

'Scarlett! What did Fred and George say to you on the very first night here? If you cross paths with Malfoy then they won't be responsible for their actions; seriously take heed of that advice! Slytherins are better not to be crossed unless you have lessons with them. Promise me Scarlett!'

Before I was about to answer her however, I caught Alyce looking at me with a rather scary knowing look in her eye – what could she possibly be planning – and then Professor Snape looked like he was about to start the lesson so I couldn't talk to her; instead I wrote her a note and passed it to her under the desk…

_Ginny,_

_Seriously don't worry about me I know what I'm doing with Draco. I mean I need to get rid of my good girl image somehow, right? So why not start with Draco?_

_Scarlett x_

She picked the note up read it and then shot me back evils so the rest of the lesson we sat next to each other in silence until lunch time when she stopped me around the same corner I'd see Draco an hour ago

'Scarlett, pretty please don't mess with fire when it comes down to Draco Malfoy. I've heard the stories off of Ron and Harry; and let me tell you I don't want you to get into a scrap like they have with him. I mean you've told me all about Alyce so why the heck would you want to get involved with the **male** version? You can get rid of your "good-girl" image some other way, Fred and George will only be too happy to oblige, but just not like this, OK?' She all but pleaded with me whilst still attached to my wrist!

'Ginny! I'm hungry so unless you have something decent to say to me I'm going to join Neville and the rest of our second year friends at lunch! If you feel like coming then great, if not then it's your loss. Bye!' I shot back, and then freeing my wrist ran down the corridor to the great hall enjoyed my lunch and Transfiguration as my last lesson, Ginny and me still weren't talking to each other until just before dinner where I finally apologised for being an absolute idiot! After which we hugged and skipped arm-in-arm to dinner – maybe the "good girl" Scarlett can stay around for a little while longer, hey!

_**(A.H.P)**_

I woke up the next morning with a feeling of unfounded embarrassment, my dream had had me reliving my meeting with Fred and George yesterday, and I hadn't realised how stupid I must have seemed. Sure I knew that I must have seemed stupid, but not that much, which tells you just how stupid it must have seemed to me now I've relived it.

Again I clambered out of bed, today less excitedly than yesterday. I checked the time, 7:30, a decent time to wake up. There was light outside and one of the beds in my dormitory was already empty and the occupant gone. Again I dressed, fussing over my hair again, I had never been so wound up about my appearance before I came here, I didn't know _**what **_was happening to me, next thing I know I'll be getting up early to put on make-up or something - that would not be a good thing for me.

I decided on a hairstyle but half way through putting my hair up into it I gave up, leaving it half styled, it didn't look too bad like this anyway. There was a singular plait pinned back on one side of my head, on the other side an identical plait hung down the side of my cheek. The rest of the hair hung down plainly as usual. The strangest hairstyle ever known to wizard-kind. I checked my uniform and left the dormitory, heading for breakfast.

As I reached the great hall I immediately spotted my friends and joined them, I scanned the hall as it already seemed to become a habit, nearly everybody was there, except I noticed, Scarlett was missing.

'you'd think you were watching out for your sister the amount of time you spend looking at that table!' Pansy told me from beside me jokingly, that was the last thing I was doing!

'no way!' I told her 'just, no!' the people around me laughed, I hadn't listened last time Draco laughed as we were laughing about the Granger girl from Scary's house. It was a warm but very slightly harsh laugh; it held friendships and happiness but seemed like he was hiding a lot of hurt. Soon they all fell silent and the laugh was forgotten, I helped myself to breakfast, getting into an interesting conversation with the group about quidditch.

'So can first years not try out for the team at all?' I asked disappointedly

'well, I'm sure you could get away with going, but you wouldn't fit in with the boys. You're not even allowed a broom first year, What position do you like to play?' Blaise asked

'um, Beater or keeper, but I guess if it's an all boy team at the moment there's no space for a girl in them positions'

'well maybe you could play something else in the future? Just keep practising until you're good enough, and you can try out next year.' Pansy suggested

'yeah… so what are you going to tryout for Draco?' I asked moving on the subject

'seeker' he told me simply, and so the conversation continued.

Soon it was time for lessons, my first lesson of charms ever. This was one of the less boring lessons, I managed to levitate objects within the first few tries, levitating the right thing however was a lot more difficult to control and took me about fifteen. I hadn't been the fastest in the class but I was definitely in the fastest half.

We spent the rest of the lesson after that attempting to perfect the skill, including lifting heavier and more distanced objects. One of the boys from my house managed to lift Flitwick off of his pile of books, without instruction to do so. Flitwick himself never seemed to know whether to be please at the spell developing, to the kid off or even to laugh; eventually he chose to laugh along with the rest of the class.

My next lesson was again transfiguration with Ravenclaw, I dreaded it, needing to sit beside Luna Lovegood again. I made my way slowly through the packed corridors, with no inclination to speed up the crowd or to dodge my way into the smaller gaps between the slowest of the students. I allowed others to overtake me and forced myself into gaps against the wall which would eventually slow my progress down further. I made it to the lesson about three minutes after McGonagall had turned up, not much later than usual but at least it was three less minutes with Luna Lovegood _**and**_ I never lost any points for being late, as I was sure to have done if I had been even two minutes later.

As soon as we were set to work Luna began her incessant babble again,

'I met your sister this morning' she began, oh no anything but this subject 'we had the first lesson together. That Professor Binns is very boring. You and your sister are very different you know, more different than you'd expect, even though you are in different houses. I hadn't expected much of a difference, but she talks all the time and you never reply. She was very friendly, she wanted to be my friend.' I refrained from agreeing how much of a freak Scarlett was for doing so. 'and she was deliberately not listening to the lesson, you focus so much on your work that it doesn't even seem like you're listening a lot of the time' yes of course, that's why I seem like I'm not listening. 'her ears are full of wrackspurts, you know what they are right?' yeah, _**that's**_ what this face meant, I know _**exactly**_ what these things are and I'm also _**very**_ interested in them too. 'well when I checked her ears they were full of them.' she started staring at my ears, I leant my head forward pretending to check the instructions I had noted down, as I had hoped my hair fell over my ears and so Luna continued her natter instead.

BREAK TIME! At last! I packed up quickly and escaped the classroom before Luna was able to follow me out. I headed for the common room again to switch over my books. When I arrived in my dormitory and had collected my books for defence against the dark arts and potions I found the stationary set my dad had brought me, still unopened. I had promised to write to him and hadn't yet done so, what time could be better than the present? I opened a window to let some air into the stiflingly hot room and spread out on my bed to write the letter:

'_Hi Dad,_

_Sorry I never wrote earlier. So much has been going on already, I hope you're not missing me too much. Anyway as I promised I'm writing now._

_Dad I'm in Slytherin! Can you believe it? It's one of the two most famous of the houses and Gryffindor is only famous because of Harry Potter, he's only been here a year! Scary-Scarlett is in Gryffindor, she hangs around with Harry Potter and the "Weasley" family. I don't know if you know of them or not, they take up practically the whole Gryffindor table! Okay so there's 5 of them in Hogwarts as far as I can tell but the group of people they hang around with means they take up loads of space._

_And dad you were right, I made friends as soon as I was sorted. All that worrying was for nothing. I now hang around with second years, three in particular but there are two other boys that talk to us a lot too. They're going to be wondering where I've got to now so I better run off._

_Love you Dad._

_Write back._

_Alyce x'_

I tucked the letter away into my robes, deciding to post it at lunchtime as I only had five minutes left of break and made my way down towards the lake, correctly assuming that my friends were there.

'Where have you been?' Pansy asked as I reached them

'just in my dormitory' I told her 'what are we talking about?'

'we were just talking about Blaise's birthday, it's coming up.' she said

'it's not that close, but it's conversation' he laughed

'when is it?' I asked

'November 25th' he briefed

'oh cool, mine's October, the fifteenth' I smiled, now sitting down.

'ah, we have a new earliest birthday.' Draco joked

'when are your birthdays?' I asked

'mine's August' Pansy said

'fifth of June' Draco added

'so what do you do for birthdays in Hogwarts? Anything good?' I asked

'not really, all we have to do is hope it falls in the weekend or that we at least have good lessons that day. We would be good to do _**something**_ really, but how much can you do in a school?' Blaise told me, I was slightly disappointed, I have to admit.

'well there's a huge hall and loads of large classrooms, it could be a good place to have a party really' I said

'they wouldn't let students use classrooms for anything but to learn and sleep.' Blaise laughed

'she's right though' Pansy said 'I wonder if we could throw a party at Hogwarts if we got the permission. We could throw one for Alyce's birthday.' Haha, I have the _**best**_ of friends. At that there was no stopping her, Pansy was clearly the sort of girl who liked a good party and was more than happy to organise one herself. She was so excitable as she went through plans or dreams of a good party for me it was as if she was a child ready to go to her first ever quidditch match after dreaming of it for years.

Soon it was time to once again confront Scarlett in defence against the dark arts. There was nothing interesting in the whole lesson, what is with this place? I thought it would be teeming with interesting things but we get a teacher who all he can do is talk about his smile and his hair and do stupid little re-enactments of his own silly little battles, I don't think he even mentioned a single spell he used. I was sitting only seven seats away from Scarlett and her friend, much too close for my liking, but as I occasionally looked over I caught her friend swooning over I can only assume the professor, he wasn't even remotely good-looking! Everytime Scarlett caught me looking at the pair, her friend would suddenly jolt up into a less dazed position, as if she had been poked, which would be just like my sister, always trying to control everything.

Eventually the lesson ended, as it had seemed to threaten not to do so for the last hour. I packed up my things that we hadn't even used and left the room in silence following Scarlett and her friend apparently unnoticed. We made our way down staircase after staircase until the crowd thinned but we kept walking, I eventually overtook my sister and her friend, and turning the corner at the top of the corridor now heading away from the great hall I saw Draco followed by Pansy, Blaise Crabbe and Goyle. I grinned as I passed them, only Pansy and Blaise returned it, Draco substituted his for a wink and a smirk. Had he not moved on yet?

Not long later I reached potions, Snape had just allowed the class inside, I sat down, spotting only my twin's friend was sat in their space, I got my things out. As I put my last ingredient onto the desk I looked up to see Scarlett practically running into the lesson. The whole class was quiet and Snape almost looked ready to start, but she never seemed to notice as she threw herself into the seat beside the ginger girl, and practically yelled over the quiet classroom,

'Oh my gosh! Draco just smiled and winked at me! He is _**so**_ amazing! I mean don't get me wrong Harry and Ron are cool too but how many times have you seen them smile or wink at anybody, hmm?' Scarlett likes Draco? I should've known with that comment she made about Draco being "dangerous" on our first day, of course she liked him. Little does she know, Draco likes me.

'Scarlett!' I could tell from the tone that her friend was about to lecture Scarlett about avoiding Draco wasn't she? This was music to my ears. It was good music until I heard their names:

'Fred and George' I listened from then:

'Fred and George say to you on the very first night here? If you cross paths with Malfoy then they won't be responsible for their actions; seriously take heed of that advice! Slytherins are better not to be crossed unless you have lessons with them. Promise me Scarlett!' her friend lectured, I don't think she realised that she was surrounded by Slytherins and the head of the house for a moment, she was in for some bullying in future for certain! But the thing ringing around in my mind was the mention of what Fred and George, do they think Slytherins shouldn't be crossed too? If they do what chance would I ever have? The pair fell silent and Scarlett looked over at me, I looked away towards the front at Snape who was still readying himself to start the lesson by writing instructions on the board. He turned to the class, as he finished.

'your instructions' he said simply 'you can start' So again we got into making our potions. I passed the class with a seven out of ten as Scarlett left with a one as her friend left with a class record of zero, which I was certain had reflected her speech at the beginning.

At lunch time I headed straight to the owlery, I sent out my owl, Lalita with the letter to dad, remembering to feed her quickly before letting her go. Heading back to school I washed my hands in the bathroom and directed my path to the great hall. I needed to talk to Draco.


	7. The Green eyed monster comes to Hogwarts

_**(A.H.P)**_

I reached the hall and found my friends, what a coincidence; nothing could've been set up better. Pansy and Blaise were sitting together, leaving the only space beside Draco. I had worked up a plan in my head by the time I had reached the hall. I approached my friends and sat down beside Draco, Pansy sent me an apologetic look. I tried to let her know it was fine. I had made a checklist in my mind, things to make sure of if my plan would ever work - and the first was to find out if Draco liked me.

I turned my legs towards Draco, making sure to let one of my legs touch his lightly. I helped myself to a small but healthy lunch and soon enough, without fail I felt Draco's hand on my knee again, so he hadn't given up on me yet, good. I forced a smile very slightly, looking down at my lunch and making sure not to make eye contact with Draco. Slowly his hand made his way further up my thigh, but as I felt his fingers reach my skirt, that was enough, I removed his hand from my leg, I could tell he still liked me and tried to make sure not to make it seem like another rejection when I moved him away or it might just ruin the plan. The next thing to do would be to see Scarlett's reaction if I'm flirting with Draco, but that could wait until tomorrow; I didn't want to give him the wrong idea.

That was when I realised Pansy was once again talking about a birthday party for me,

'Who could we ask to get permission? Snape?'

'You're still on this?' I asked

'Yeah, you'd like a party wouldn't you?' she said, she had be there, I love a good party and not that I would tell her yet but I had ideas for myself too. I answered with a grin and an amused exhale, which had meant to be a laugh.

'You _**could**_ ask Snape' Blaise told her, 'but it's probably better to ask Dumbledore himself, as much as it pains me to say so'

'Snape might ask Dumbledore for you, but whether he'd agree with the idea in the first place would be the problem.' Draco told us, 'Dumbledore is a pushover when it comes to goody-goody things like birthday parties, we could always get my father involved if we didn't want to talk to _**him**_ ourselves, but father would be as critical as Snape about the idea'

'Oh would you try, Draco?' Pansy asked sounding slightly uncharacteristically posh

'Fine, I'll give it a go, but my owl's delivering a letter now, I'll check if it's back in the Owlery tomorrow' he said, this was fantastic. It was like they wanted this plan to work, I could go with Draco to the Owlery tomorrow, and hopefully see Scarlett on the way. Perfect.

We enjoyed a peaceful lunchtime after this then I had my first lesson of Herbology; I had seen the greenhouses before and never needed help finding my way. As I reached the greenhouses the Ravenclaws were standing outside again, I had forgotten to check who I had this lesson with. I avoided Luna at all costs and tried to join in with a conversation that the Slytherin girls were having, failing this I tried with the boys. So I never really fitted in with this year group, but I could talk to the boys to some extent.

The teacher called us into the classroom, she was plump with flyaway hair and was slightly mental looking but she looked friendlily upon us. I stood in the line beside the boys from my house like I had done in Potions, I could barely even see Luna from here, just the way I liked it. Professor Sprout had laid out several plant pots, one for each of us in two lines down each side of the table. She started the lesson by asking us questions about the plant in question and then we were to re-plant, feed and care for it - until the end of term. Sure not the hardest work in the world but this plant hits back if you get annoyed. It was a Vogelesser plant, which roughly translates from German to bird eater and if that doesn't tell you how rough this plant is nothing will.

The hour dragged along, I could see the quidditch pitch from where I stood and spent the lesson dreaming about flying in between small bursts of work. Finally the lesson ended, I headed for dinner: just the regular meal. Afterwards being exhausted, I headed straight to bed.

That night I had a dream about the plan I had concocted. I woke up in a state early the next morning, it was dark outside but I knew I couldn't sleep again. I put on my dressing gown and slippers, leaving the dormitory with my school clothes in a bag, I walked through the common room and out into the corridors, I was sure it was early but oh well. I passed several paintings on the wall, all moaning at me for using lumos and waking them. I continued walking until I reached the first year girls bathroom. One of the close-by paintings made an extra effort to complain,

'most students get a shower just before after hours or straight after lessons finish you know!'

'thanks I'll keep that in mind!' I yelled back at him making more portraits start shouting out in annoyance. In the bathroom I chose to have a shower rather than a bath and hopped into a cubicle. Just like on the edge of the bath there were several taps around me, ones to select different smells, colours and effects on the water, and by effects I mean rainbows and bubbles and things. I chose one of the many flowery smelling taps and the rainbow effect water and turned on the relaxing, refreshing water.

I stayed in the shower for about half an hour, then wrapping a towel around me and left the cubicle to collect my clothes. I went into one of the empty cubicles a few spaces along, these were the only really dry ones and everyone used them for changing rooms. I straightened myself out and left towards the common room again, now carrying my bed clothes. It was _**still **_dark outside, just how early did I get up?

As I reached my dormitory, I put my things away and checked the time, it was only 6:30! Are you kidding me? I've been up for at least an hour and a half now and am totally awake.

Bored, bored, bored, bored. Was that a house-elf in the corner? No of course it wasn't, if we _**did**_ have them at Hogwarts, they'd be out of this common room by now. I mean the house that made them our slaves in the first place, they wouldn't stick around long in here. I put my feet up on the common room armchair, my head fell down in front of the other arm pushing my hair over my face, I heard something moving in the room but as I looked nothing was there… the noise continued behind the chair, followed by the creak of the common room wall opening, had there been an elf in here?

For an hour I sat with my hair covering my face and my feet hanging over the opposite side of the chair, I actually became quite comfortable. Suddenly I heard somebody on the staircases, I tried to move but gave up, not wanting to ruin my comfy position. Maybe they wont see me. No such luck, whoever it was lifted my hair out of my face,

'comfy?' Blaise asked

'very'

'so should I just leave you here with your hair over your face? Or what?' he continued looking oddly at me, but that could just be because he was upside down. I tilted my head, yeah he was definitely looking oddly at me

'that depends. What does "what" include?' I asked thoughtfully

'umm, coming down to breakfast? Brushing your hair? Anything that doesn't include looking like a complete idiot?' he suggested, I considered my options carefully. I was _**fond**_ of looking like an idiot… but I was getting hungry.

'okay I'll go for the what I guess.' I told him at last as his face seemed to be finding me very amusingly odd, my favourite kind of reputation. He put my hair over my face again and I rolled off of the seat sideways landing face first on the floor. Deliberately ungracefully I got up from the floor, causing a head rush fit for the queen of weirdoes like me and stumbled from left to right before falling back into the chair I had just rolled out of. 'I can look like an idiot later' I told him.

I checked my reflection in the mirror, I looked like I had been dragged through a hedge backwards but couldn't be bothered to do anything about it. I was still dizzy as I stood up and practically clung to Blaise as I walked drunkenly towards the great hall. It was a great day so far and it hadn't even started yet. Blaise was in hysterics by the time we reached the great hall, probably embarrassed about the way I was acting and looked, but hey, where's the fun in being normal? We sat down at the table in almost the same place as we had eaten dinner the night before. We were the only ones on our long table as no other Slytherins had yet climbed out of bed (I speak from the knowledge of being in that common room for an hour laying with my head in a chair's armpit)

'what is with you today?' Blaise asked me, still very amused, I shrugged happily,

'I think it was the rainbow water' I told him grinning, knowing I'd confuse him. As expected he looked at me with a confused but amused face

'rainbow water?' he repeated

'm-hmm. Ooh!' I grinned as I spotted a sugar-coated cereal I had never tried before, I poured some into my bowl. I let Blaise watch me for a minute before explaining 'the rainbow water in the shower'

'oh right!' he said, now he understood, 'do you really think you should be eating things covered in sugar today?'

'yeah, looks tasty, wanna try some?' I flicked some at him happily and laughed as he covered his face. Seriously, what _**is**_ with me today? something must have gotten me into a good mood somehow.

'okay' he said disbelievingly. Yep, I had gotten weirder! HOW COOL! I added milk to my cereal and started munching away at it. Blaise followed suit by picking out his own breakfast.

Soon one by one Pansy, Crabbe and Goyle joined us at our seats.

'Alyce what happened to you this morning? You look like you've been beaten up by a bludger.

'what is there something on my robes?' I asked purposefully stupidly,

'she's a bit… hyper' Blaise explained

'OOH! I need to get my things for today, I'll be back soon.' I told them and darted out of the hall, the only thing I heard them say was:

'don't we have half an hour before lessons?'

When I got out of the hall I slowed down again, suddenly aware off how hot the day was, if I started running then I'd get sweaty and if I got sweaty now what would have been the point of having a shower at 5 in the morning? Even if it did have rainbow water.

Reaching the common room I checked my timetable: Transfiguration with the Ravenclaws, Herbology with the Ravenclaws, double history of magic with Hufflepuff ('fantastic' I thought to myself sarcastically) and Co-operative Wizardry, with the Slytherins? Is this right? I knew there was a reason I was so happy, I wasn't with Scary-Scarlett all day! I gathered my things for the first two lessons, tidied my hair at last (I didn't want to look like Professor Sprout's daughter or anything) and made my way back to the great hall. Draco had now joined the table too I sat opposite Blaise as I had been before I left.

'guys, what's co-operative wizardry?' I asked them 'and why do I have it with the Slytherins? That's a typo, right?'

'no,' Pansy told me 'it's a new lesson, you're parents probably wont have known much if anything about it before you got your Hogwarts letter and so they wouldn't have been able to tell you about it. It's basically a lesson with all the year groups from our house, we'll do catch up sessions, practise spells and skills from duelling to gobstones, the quidditch games will be held then and teachers can have meetings with the students for one reason or another if they need to, so you don't miss other classes as often' So basically a free range lesson, I love it. Soon the owl post came, I saw a familiar owl soaring towards me. Lalita! Dad had already replied. She landed swiftly in front of me and let me remove the letter from her leg, I unfolded it as she ate a bit of Draco's breakfast as mine had been finished and took off towards the window she had entered through,

'_Alyce,_

_That's okay kiddo, quite a bit has been happening at work too. What interesting lives we lead._

_That's great, you being in Slytherin, but make sure you behave yourself. It's a shame you and your sister couldn't be in the same house, you could've began to get along. Then again, you two, sharing a dormitory? I don't think she'd be home at the end of the year so maybe it's for the best, I wouldn't like to face your mother's wrath after that "mishap"._

_And yes I know of the Weasley family, the twins, Fredrick and Gregory I think that's what they're called write to us all the time at Zonko's trying to get a new load of tricks to use at school. Watch your back with them two on Scarlett's side, though I'm sure with your new found Slytherin cunning you could play a trick or two on them too, here's some new stock for you to try out for me, remember to report back. But of course, yes it has been initially tested professionally by us at the London store too so you wont get into too much trouble._

_Have fun with your new friends and remember to keep writing._

_Dad x_'

I looked at what my dad had sent with the letter, 'instant drying fake spots to stick on _**any**_ competition. The more you squeeze - the bigger they get. Comes off naturally if left alone for 10 days or ran under freezing water' Ha! I knew some ways I could use this.

'what's that?' Pansy asked me

'a letter from dad, he works in Zonko's and sent me a new product sample.' I went to show her the tub of the spot causing liquid, but never opened my hand enough for her to see the label.

Soon it was time to head up to our lessons. Transfiguration was again tedious beside Luna Lovegood, but was easily made up for when I couldn't see her in Herbology while we tended to the exact same Vogelesser plant as we'd be looking after all term. As break time approached I had my plan that I had devised yesterday back in mind. I needed to know where Scarlett heads to at break before Draco goes to see his owl. The lesson ended quickly enough. I made a deal of knocking over one of the boys things and my own so I could fuss about collecting everything together which would give my sister a head start to get outside first. I made my way through the tangle of corridors until I reached the front of school, I walked slowly towards the lake Scarlett was already sitting with her ginger friend and the whole gang of gingers complete with Harry Potter and Granger on the lakeside. Metres away in the shade of a tree was Pansy who was about to sit down with all our friends, one good thing about them all being second years is that they all arrived at once and were already in deep conversation so I could do whatever I pleased without them generally noticing. I made my way over to them and got some spare parchment from my bag with my quill. I scribbled another letter to my dad in reply to the one at breakfast:

'_Hi again dad,_

_This product sounds fantastic, I would be more than happy to test it out for you, I have the perfect target, I'll get back to you with my review as soon as I've tried it out._

_The twins names are Fred and George, I guess Fred's full name could be Fredrick, but I'm certain it's just George._

_And are you kidding monkey-man? Scary-Scarlett and I sharing a room? She wouldn't even last a night! - She still calls mum "mummy", I mean she's a _**child**_! If she were in Slytherin she'd be minced meat by now and if I were I Gryffindor I'd _**have**_ to kill someone. Okay over the top - I wouldn't have minded Gryffindor, but I couldn't stand some of the company Scarlett is holding, I'm much happier where I am._

_My friends are trying to get me a birthday party in the great hall! We don't know if we'd be allowed it yet but Pansy had the whole thing practically planned out in half a lunch time._

_Got to go, I'll write back about the Zonko's stuff soon._

_Bye, Alyce x._'

'replying to your dad?' Pansy asked looking around at the scratching of my quill.

'yeah.' I told her, this was my perfect moment, the subject had been raised, part two of my plan, seeing Scarlett's reaction. 'umm Draco, have you written to your dad yet? We could go to the Owlery now and post the letters'

'sure, I can scribble something down when we get there though' he said seeming to be happy at the chance to be alone with me, what could be better for the plan? We got up and leaving our things with the others except some ink, a quill and parchment in Draco's pocket for him to write with, we made our way to the Owlery. It would take us mere seconds to reach Scarlett and her friends, I needed to get her attention and I needed to start flirting. Luckily I had it all planned out all I needed was for Draco to comply. I forced myself to trip over headlong clumsily on a stone, as I landed on the floor I began to laugh hysterically, being as loud as what could be considered normal so I could to capture the attention of Scarlett.

'Whoops, clumsy me' I laughed as Draco offered a hand up. I allowed him to pick me up from the ground, we were centimetres away from each other now. I stayed there for a second looking into Draco's eyes willing him to flirt back before backing away to his side, I flashed a look at Scarlett, she and her friends were all watching, a few too many eyes but I suppose they'd help her to relive the moment by talking about it once it's over. I laughed some more now looking back at Draco a lot more quietly,

'I'm so clumsy it's like I need help to walk' I giggled slightly, I was hoping Draco would laugh too but he never, no! it might all go wrong now. He smirked slightly and said to me quietly

'well let me help you out then' and wrapped his arm around my waist, pulling me closer to his side. Well it wasn't what I had planned but it was working, I felt uncomfortable but tried not to let it show as I flicked my eyes back to Scarlett. I was certain her face had reddened slightly and her eyes were watering, she gave me the most evil look she could muster but she was clearly hurt. We finished crossing the Gryffindors path before I pulled away from Draco slightly, I couldn't pull away entirely or he, along with everyone still watching could get suspicious. That was it, I could _**definitely**_ use Draco to get to Scarlett, she liked him enough to get hurt and he liked me enough to hurt her. Guilt pinged my heart at the thought, it would hurt Draco too, who I suppose was now technically a [very] close friend. I couldn't go through with it, but at least I knew it would work if I wanted it to and I had managed to teach Scarlett a lesson for telling the world about her crushes in future.

_**(S.V.P)**_

As I was tucking into my breakfast the next morning I heard lots of hooting followed by a flurry of wings and then as if by magic, well this **is** Hogwarts after all, a letter fell a few inches short of my plate of eggs and bacon. I turned it over to see the lovely scrawl that was my mum's so without further ado I ripped the envelope open and read the following,

_Scarlett,_

_How are you settling into Hogwarts? What house did you get sorted into? Aside from writing to ask how you are I am also writing to return Bicky's toys to you; you left them at home in all your excitement you silly moose! Are you and Alyce getting along with each other? Do I have to write a letter to your father?_

_Well, darling, I must dash now as I have a deadline that's due in, in approximately two hours time. Write back to me using Felicia because I know what a pain the School owls are._

_Hope to hear from you very soon._

_All my love and lots of hugs,_

_Mummy xxx_

After I had read the letter I found a fairly big package lying in the middle of the table between Ginny's breakfast plates and mine so I picked it up and found, as my mum said they would be, Bicky's toys! I quickly finished my breakfast and raced up stairs to my dorm to give Bicky her gift; she was very happy about this of course, I then scanned my timetable to find that not only was I **not** with Alyce at all today I was also cutting it very fine if I wanted to be early to Herbology so I picked up all the books I needed for first and second lesson, ran down the stairs and came to a skidding halt in front of Ginny who was looking at her watch as if she was about to throttle me if I had been five seconds later!

'Where the heck did you run off to? You do realise that Herbology starts in, oh, TWO MINUTES!' After that mad outburst she yanked me from the last step and pulled me towards the greenhouses, trying not to get crushed by the other years in the process, we finally arrived at the greenhouses breathing heavily but luckily not that late so no points were deducted from Gryffindor, phew, once we had found two spare plant pots near to each other we turned to face Professor Sprout to hear what the lesson today would entail – the Vogelesser plant from last lesson – once she was satisfied that we had listened to our instructions she set us to work – watering the plant and then collecting any of the venom that it gives off; so not much for an hour lesson then! – We set to work watering them with our wands and collecting the venom into the vials that Professor Sprout had provided at our workstations for us. Just as Ginny and I were collecting the last of it Professor Sprout caught our attention so that we could give her the vials to keep until next lesson, on Monday, after we had given ours to her we packed up our things and headed to Transfiguration, again with the Hufflepuffs, Professor McGonnagall smiled at us as we walked proudly down the corridor heading to her lesson arm-in-arm laughing and talking about Bicky and Scabbers, Ron's pet rat, when we eventually arrived at the classroom door, first in the line as usual, we pestered her about what we would be covering in today's lesson and she sternly replied, with a smile in her eyes,

'Miss Paiper and Weasley, why can't you wait until the rest of your classmates arrive and I can tell you all together?'

We stared up at her almost begging her to reveal her lesson plan for us; she took this hint in good grace and lent down so that both of us could hear and whispered the following:

'We will be changing the colour of planks wood, happy about that girls?' She then lifted her head up as the rest of the class formed a line behind Ginny and I. 'You may proceed into the classroom; quietly please!'

After we got into the classroom Ginny and I chose the two empty, as is typical of this lesson, seats at the front of the class and got our books out of our bags and then promptly sat up to listen to McGonnagall tell us what we would be doing, even though we knew it was still good to pay attention, once she had finished her plan of the lesson for us we were left to turn the plank of wood in front of us to whatever colour our wands could muster – my plank went purple and Ginny's went green. Because McGonnagall was so pleased with how well Ginny and I had done with changing the colour she let us go ten minutes early! With the extra ten minutes added to my break time I dumped my books from first and second lesson onto my bed and picked up my books for double Charms that I had after break – WOW! Could my day **get** any better? – And my parchment and quill, put them into my bag then headed down to my most favourite spot at Hogwarts, the lake, once I arrived I took out the parchment and quill and one of my Charms books to lean on and composed the following to my mum:

_Mummy!_

_It's **so** great to hear from you! I'm settling in fine at Hogwarts. I have made a best friend called Ginny Weasley (we met them at Kings Cross remember?) and all her brothers have been really nice to me as well; I got sorted into Gryffindor – just like you were Mummy! _

_Thank you very much for sending Bicky's toys to me she's a very contented kitty-cat now! _

_As for Alyce and me… Well seeing how she was sorted into Slytherin it was always going to be doomed from the start, wasn't it? No! Mummy please don't write to Dad it'll just give her more reason to detest me! Talking of Slytherins actually I have developed a little crush on one of the boys called Draco Malfoy, he's in the second year, isn't that the same boy who wrote to you all of last year begging you to send him some of the Wimbourne Wasps Quidditch memorabilia? Don't worry about me though, my interests have been well spread and I'm not going to go running after one guy obsessively, I do have a bit of a soft spot for Ginny's older brother, Ron and his friend Harry Potter too!_

_Hope the deadline was finished with enough time to spare and you got a chance to practice all your old moves from your Holly Head Harpies days._

There was a thud close behind me, whipping me away from my thoughts and the letter. I turned to see - Ohmigosh! Draco! I lost my line of vision as it focussed only on him. He reached his arm out towards somebody on the floor who took his hand, how much I'd love to be that person... OH MY GOD! Alyce. The rest of my vision came back into focus with a crash, what was _**she **_doing with _**him**_, like _**that**_? Next thing I knew they were centimetres away from each other, if both had pouted their lips may have even met. She was giggling into his ear, as he looked admiringly at her, that _**slut**_! How could she do this to me? This was another level, even for her. I felt my face go red. Alyce backed away from Draco slightly, still giggling to him. Maybe this was the end of it? Just then Draco took her by the waist and pulled her towards him. I thought he liked me. My eyes welled up at Draco's movement but even as my vision blurred and the distorted shape of two people, now looking like one, moved towards and pass us the sight pulled on my heart strings. I heard my friends breaths beside me and knew they or at least Ginny would soon be focussing on me, I wiped at my teary eyes allowing some vision to come back and looked at my watch willing my friends not to watch me yet. Seeing the time I knew I had to wrap up the letter now. I signed it and folded it up:

_I love you very much and I hope to hear from you very soon!_

_All my love, hugs and kisses,_

_Scarlett xxx_

I pulled myself together completely; I was now ready to go to Charms. So I carefully placed the letter into my bag, between my two Charms books, and ran up to the castle. I managed to get into the classroom behind the rest of the class, another non-loss of house points; I was doing well today! I found my usual seat between Luna and Ginny so I walked quietly down the rows and snuck into the desk, they both beamed up at me as I took out my books – both asked what the parchment between them was all about so of course I explained it to them Ginny then asked how I was after the Alyce and Draco stunt at break and I mumbled that I was OK; so she left it well alone – I then turned to listen to Professor Flitwick squeak at us that he wanted our homework from last lesson in to him all three of us bound up to the front of the classroom to hand ours in, don't tell anyone but I did an extra two rolls of parchment courtesy of Miss Hermione Granger; of course Ginny and Luna don't need to know that, when he was satisfied that **all** the class had handed in their homework he set us to work on revising the_ Wingardium Leviosa _charm from the last lesson, we did that for the rest of the first lesson – once you get the hang of it it's pretty easy so I helped my fellow classmates out by showing them how to do it properly –

'You are just like Hermione!' Ginny whispered into my ear 'she did this to all of her class last year! It really got on Ron's nerves hehe'

I always knew there was a reason why Hermione and me had bonded so well!

Once the fourth lesson had started Professor Flitwick set us onto a new charm; the Cushioning Charm (_Spongify) _– he showed us what was supposed to happen and the entire class was in awe of the fact that the Professor had just made the pile of books he was standing on turn into cushions! So, naturally, of course we were all anxious to try it out so with that he told us the incantation and we got to work until the end of the lesson. He didn't even set us an essay as homework! Instead he told us to practice the new charm; so off me and my two friends went to enjoy our lunch!

Lunch was a lovely affair as always; me and Hermione shared stories of our last four lessons while the boys, and Ginny for that matter, groaned and tucked into their lunch. Hermione and I then picked up a rather healthy lunch of salad and tuna fish and she helped me with the cushioning charm – we ended up turning Harry's goblet into a cushion, to say he was furious is an understatement! – After having our fun we headed outside to our usual spot under the tree that overlooks the lake when I suddenly realised that I still had the letter to my mum in between my two Charms books! I had already had a plan up my sleeve to get Alyce back for the stunt she and Draco pulled this morning at break all I needed was Fred and George to help me out… So with that I quickly scanned the throng of students coming out of the great hall and spied Alyce, Draco and Fred! So I stayed where I was and waited for him to come over to us, which he did;

'Hey you lot! George has just headed up to the Owlery to try and get more Zonko's products for us; he'll be back soon. Mind if I join you?' he then sat down next to me – this was it, if this didn't work nothing would!

'Err… Fred?' I whispered into his ear so that Ginny and Ron couldn't hear me. 'I'm feeling rather tired and I really, really need to send my mum an owl reply to the letter that she sent me this morning I was wondering if you would mind awfully giving me a piggyback ride up to the Owlery? George can give me one back down so don't worry about sticking around!' I finished my plea with a genuine smile.

'Well, Scarlett, seeing how you asked me so nicely I would only be too happy to oblige as will George! Why don't we move over here a bit before my little sibilings throw a hissy fit?' So we moved to a spare patch of grass – in the middle of the Gryffindor and Slytherin huddles – and I jumped onto his back and off we went up to the Owlery; I had the letter carefully tucked into the pocket of my robes so as not to damage it. On the way up to the castle I caught my sister's eye, as well as Draco's, she looked as if she wanted to hex me! So I played her at the same game as she had done at break with me and laughed along with Fred as we ran up to the Owlery, he let me down once we reached the door and he walked in with me so that he could tell George of our little plan – OK so maybe I hadn't been so subtle, ahh well – who laughed back and nodded at both of us and then Fred left to go back and join our friends by the lake and I was left to search for Felicia, after I had found her and managed to coax her down from her perch on the highest beam of the Owlery once she had decided that it would be a good idea to come down so that I could send mum the reply back she swooped down and landed right on my outstretched arm with that I attached the letter to her leg and told her to head straight to 'Mum, and **no** detours!' With that I walked over to the window and watched as she flew from my arm towards my, first, home. Suddenly I became very aware of George standing behind me so I turned around to see his beaming face, and walked towards him and he bent down to my level and said the following:

'Your carriage awaits Madame! Now as you're a first year I'm going to assume you're not that heavy, am I right?'

After he had finished saying that I smacked him round the back of his head with a giggle 'Of course I'm not heavy! How can you say such a thing?' and off we went! We finally reached our band of merry friends I jumped down from his back and legged it across the few centimetres between Ginny and me and gave her the biggest hug and spun her round and round until we were both dizzy and in a heap on the floor!

'Wow! Scarlett are you OK? You were up in the Owlery for ages!' she asked me whilst catching her breath and gathering herself together

'Yeah I'm fine, oh sorry about that I just had some business to attend to…' I replied giving the twins a knowing look as I finished the sentence and shot a look behind me at my sister and stuck my tongue out at her – I then got the most brilliant idea; so with that I grabbed my wand and pointed it straight at her spell book and said under my breath '_Spongify__'_! Unfortunately she had taken off the necklace that our paternal great-grandma had given her when we were four, and still living as a happy family, to show one of her "friends" so the spell hit that instead of the book and if that didn't make it worse it also hit her hand so without any hesitation I stood up grabbed all my things together and said to the huddle around me

'I don't know about you lot but I really think it's time we… RUN!'

And just like that I was running as fast as my little, well I am only 11 after all, legs could carry me, as was she! No! She was gaining on me fast! I whipped my head around to check on the state of my friends, and sister, and saw the three Weasley boys running after me so I slowed down – bad idea – suddenly I felt a tap on my shoulder so I, thinking it was Ron, stopped to an abrupt halt only to find out that it was in fact Alyce who just stood there and screamed at me:

'You know what that necklace was! FIX IT OR I'LL HEX YOU INTO NEXT WEEK!'

After that over emotional outburst I was just about to turn back around and run away again when I spied out of the corner of my eye her rather enlarged hand and that was it I was in complete hysterics! I also happened to catch the eye of Draco and the rest of Alyce's friends and they were laughing too!

'Guys! Shut up! You're supposed to be my friends! Why are you laughing along with **HER**?' She all but screamed at them, this of course just made all three of us laugh harder – she was acting like a spoiled brat – so to try and ignore them she continued to rant and rave at me!

'You are such a child! Just because you're in the un-cool house, and I get to hang out with Draco and Pansy (she beckoned over to them) doesn't give you the right to ruin the stuff that I hold dear to me, does it?' After that she pushed me to the ground! Everyone around us, Draco and Pansy included, gasped at her. Once I'd recovered from the shock I looked up at the twins and said

'Erm? Guys a little help here?'

'We're on it Scarlett' and with that I was lifted onto Fred and George's shoulders and Alyce was left with the rest of her Slytherin clan to go to the hospital wing to deflate her hand, well I think that's where they were planning on going I couldn't see them through the fuzz of tears brimming on the bottom of my eyelashes…

Eventually we reached the Gryffindor common room, naturally everybody had heard about the massive sibling fight that had just happened so they all wanted to know how I was, and Fred and George set me down onto the sofa but when the crowd descended on me they got rid of them for me,

'Hey, hey! Give the girl some space she's just faced the **female** version of Draco Malfoy' this got everybody's attention and they dutifully left me alone.

A few seconds later I muttered to Ginny and Hermione:

'Would you mind awfully if I went up to the dorm? I just need time to myself before the last lesson of the day, sorry' I smiled a weak smile at both of them and then ascended the stairs to the girl's dorm; as soon as I reached my bed I wept. For the loss of my sister and the, possible, loss of Draco!

Ten minutes later I felt a gentle tapping on my shoulder and I shot up in bed with a start, I had obviously dozed off after all my weeping, there I saw Ginny standing next to my bed with a box of tissues in one hand and both of our bags over her shoulders; she truly was the best friend ever! I wiped my eyes and took my bag from her shoulder and we walked back to the common room arm-in-arm. Because we were first years this Co-operative Wizardry lesson was mainly going to be spent in the common room doing homework and practicing skills we had learned so far; we very quickly found Hermione and Ron but no Harry, Fred or George!

'Hermione? Ron? Where's Harry, Fred and George?' I asked them whilst still scanning the common room almost expecting the twins to jump out from behind one of the curtains any moment; no such luck!

'Well seeing how Harry, Fred and George are all on the house Quidditch team and this lesson is called Co-operative Wizardry then that means they can fit in extra practice and I get left here to be bossed around by Hermione about homework! I hate my life!' Ron sulked at me in reply whilst giving Hermione evils, which she picked up so turned to Ginny and me and said rather haughtily,

'Well that's as may be what you think, Ronald, but let me tell you I won't be giving Harry any help once he comes back from practice, so just count yourself lucky that I'm helping you at all! Girls? Do you need any help with homework?' She said beaming up at us

'No thanks Hermione; we're fine at the moment. Plus I don't think I should try any more incantations, do you?' I laughed slightly as I said it to her.

Unfortunately the humour of my last sentence was short lived when Professor McGonagall came swooping into the Common Room and made her way towards Ginny and me!

'Miss Paiper would you mind coming with me to my office?' I looked at Ginny as I followed the Professor out of the room, she didn't give me any indication as to what it could be about so I was just left to wait… When we arrived to the door, I realised that we were off to see the Headmaster – ohh this can't be good I thought – as we ascended up the revolving stairs my Potions teacher and my sister met us at the top! Oh great this was because of the fight at lunch, wasn't it?

'Ahh the other Miss Paiper! Glad you could join us; Minerva, Severus, I can take it from here thank you.' With that our two heads of houses left and so I just stood there staring at the floor and occasionally Professor Dumbledore. Finally he broke the silence,

'Now girls you may be wondering why Professor's McGonagall and Snape bought you up to see me. Well it's so that I can have a little chat about what happened between you two during the lunch break; which of you would like to go first?'

'I would, Professor.' I piped up from behind Alyce. They both turned to look at me.

'Go ahead… Forgive me would you mind telling me which one of you is which?'

'I'm Scarlett, and that is my twin Alyce' I replied whilst beckoning towards her

'Ahh, thank you very much, Scarlett, now you may begin your side of the story' He smiled at me and I saw his blue eyes sparkle back at me!

'Right, well the thing is… We were set homework from Professor Flitwick to practice the _Spongify _charm and at lunch I decided to try it out on one of Alyce's spell books… Unfortunately she happened to be taking off her necklace that our great-grandma gave her when we were four and the spell hit the necklace and her hand! So that's what caused the massive chase from the lake to the castle… How many house points are you deducting from me?' I whimpered the last part, I couldn't help it – I'd been having such a good day too!

'Scarlett, Scarlett. There is nothing to worry about yet. Thank you very much for telling me your turn of events, would you kindly mind going back to your common room and I will call for you again when I have finished with Alyce.'

So with that I turned on my heel and went back to my common room and sat in a transfixed silence wondering and waiting for my, inevitable, fate…


	8. Revenge never tasted so sour

_**(S.V.P)**_

As the bell rang signalling the end of lessons for the day the whole common room grabbed their stuff and headed off to the separate dorms to get ready dinner, Ginny and I followed suite, as we heading back into the common room Professor McGonagall stopped us in our tracks; turning to me and saying:

'Miss Paiper, Professor Dumbledore has made his decision and would like to come with me to his office now, before dinner, so that you may enjoy the rest of your evening with your friends.' After she said this she gave a small to Ginny and swooped out of the portrait hole with me following at her heels.

As we reached the familiar phoenix statue guarding the entrance to Dumbledore's office my heart started to pound faster and my breathing got heavier I couldn't panic now!

'It's all going to be OK; Dumbledore always likes the Gryffindors. You know that! You just need to calm down Scarlett…' I muttered under my breath and then the Phoenix jumped to the side to let Professor McGonagall and me up to the office. I scanned my eyes around looking for the back of Alyce's head, I must be more nervous then I thought, as soon as I'd stopped giving myself eye strain I heard two pairs of feet on the stairs so I turned around to face the door and who should creak it open? You guessed it! Professor Snape with my sister trailing behind him; looking more then nervous then I'd ever seen her in my life!

'Ahh I'm glad you could join us Alyce! Now then Minerva and Severus would you be so kind as to leave the girls and me to it? I promise you that they shall be returned to the feast in due course' He smiled back at our heads of houses with his twinkling blue eyes.

Once Professor Snape had shut the door behind both him and McGonagall Dumbledore turned his eyes to us – uh-oh here it comes!

'Now then, I have given your punishment a lot of considerable thought and I have decided that since neither of you were injured during your sibling argument I am only going to deduct house points. Scarlett I am deducting ten points from Gryffindor; because of causing your sisters hand to inflate. However, Alyce, I'm afraid I am going to have to deduct fifteen points from Slytherin because you pushed your sister over and as I am sure you are aware that is not the Hogwarts way.'

Now whilst I was happy with his punishment for us; Alyce wasn't! So with that she opened her mouth to rebuke him, it got as far as this:

'B-B-But Pro-Prof-Professor Dumbledore! That's so unf…'

Then the Headmaster put his hand up to silence her and continued on with what he had been trying to say previously

'Now please, go off and join the feast. I hope the next time I see either one of you it will be to give you praise and not punishment. Good night girls' with that we were ushered out of the door by the Headmaster and left to make our way to dinner; whilst on the way there Alyce and me **tried** to make polite conversation, try being the operative word,

'Ally, I'm really sorry that Dumbledore took five extra points off of your house, just because you pushed me over; when we all know why you did it.'

'Yeah, well you never took the points away, so forget it' Alyce said half-heartedly

'Yes, but still. I hate the fact that us two fight all the time _**and**_ our houses are rivals!'

'They only say the houses are rivals, that doesn't mean every person has to be rivals. But its just the way we are, S we always have fought' Alyce replied 'I mean can you name one time we actually got along?'

'When we were four' I said with a weak smile, no-one spoke for a while 'Ally? You Ok?'

'Yeah, I was just thinking of the necklace… and our great grandma's funeral…but it's okay'

'I'm so sorry about the whole Charm thing, I forgot you'd super-glued it to your neck' Scarlett said, beginning by sniffing back tears but finishing by laughing slightly.

'It's okay, Draco fixed it for me'

'Wow... D-D-Draco's really talented isn't he' Scarlett said, blushing

'Uh... yeah I suppose' Alyce said awkwardly

'Well I'm still glad Fred and George were there to save the day'

'Yeah... I umm... didn't hurt you did I?' Alyce said, still smiling but reddening slightly on the cheeks

'You? Hurt me? Nah it was just a shock that was all'

'Ok... Good'

'Good? Did you just say good?' I asked 'what the heck has Draco done to you? Or more specifically the twins?'

'The - the -the twins? What do u mean?' Alyce dismissed 'and no-ones done anything to me!'

'Oh come on Ally! I've seen the way you look at them, and at lunchtime yesterday! I'm your twin! I know these things!'

'No, they were just being... Embarrassing' Alyce dismissed again 'how can u hang out with them really?'

'They're funny! Make me smile and laugh, damn sight better than Malfoy and Pansy!'

'Oh yeah? Pansy is a fantastic friend, and I _**know**_ you like Draco'

'HOW? I haven't shown any signs!'

'Oh yeah! _**Signs**_? There couldn't be more _**signs**_'

'Like what? Oh yeah your little stunt at break this morning was to show me up wasn't it? WELL THANKS A MILLION ALLY!' I huffed

'To teach you a lesson. You should've heard yourself in Potions! How pathetic you sounded, if you don't want the world to know then don't scream at it.'

Alyce advised me, then in an uncanny (well we are twins after all) imitation added 'Draco just smiled and winked at me! How often do you see Ron or Harry do that!'

'Oh and you blushing at Fred and George wasn't as bad?'

'You don't have a clue what they were saying! Of course I was blushing, you would've been too if you were there!'

'Alyce and Fred sitting in a tree K-I-S-S-I-N-G! See ya loser'

After I'd insulted her I ran off to the Gryffindor house table to join Ginny and her brothers to recount what had just been exchanged between Alyce and me on the way from the Headmaster's study to say that their gasps could be heard by the three remaining house tables is a definite understatement! Ron was the first to recover quickly:

'Aww Scarlett! I'm really sorry to hear that; and here I was thinking that Malfoy was the only person who could make my blood boil!'

Quickly followed by Harry:

'Ron, mate, don't you think you're being a little harsh? I mean, yes, granted Alyce is a Slytherin and Scarlett and her don't get on so well – like you and the rest of your siblings here – but is that any reason to condemn her to a life of exile, just because we don't get on with Malfoy or Parkinson?'

Hermione and Ginny had finally heard enough so with that they frog-marched us three out of the Great Hall; lucky we'd finished dinner hey? Once we were through the portrait hole Ginny ran up to the girl's dorm to get her Gobstones kit; Ron ran the other way to gather up his Wizard's chess set; Hermione on the other hand just sat down at the quietest table in the whole common room and took out her Defence Against the Dark Arts book and some rolls of parchment plus a quill and started to do homework! Once the other two came down the stairs and Harry and I were seated opposite them ready to play the two games with our best friends.

Thirty minutes in and Hermione slammed the book shut turned around to the four of us and moaned at us:

'Why is nobody doing any work?'

'Erm… Maybe it's got something to do with the fact that is free time and we can do what the bloody hell we want!' Ron replied while the rest of us sat around laughing our heads off it was always a joy to watch Hermione and Ron have a go at each other like an old married couple!

Ginny then put her two Knuts in, after having recovered from laughing so hard of course,

'Hermione, for once, I agree with Ron! You **need** to take a break from all this schoolwork! We've been here for three full days and nights and you haven't hung out with **us** once; except for at the feasts! So I'm telling you right this second Hermione Jean Granger to get your arse over here and you can play the winner of Gobstones!' She gave Hermione a withering look, anyone who ignored those could pretty much consider himself or herself crossed off Ginny's Christmas card list, or so I'd heard…

We spent the rest of evening alternating between playing Gobstones with Ginny and Wizard's chess with Ron; eventually we were all so tired that we packed up the games and ascended up to our separate dorms and slept like logs until morning…

As the sun streamed in through the windows signalling that the sun had risen and therefore so had morning; due to the fact that this had woken me up I decided to go and have a shower in the girl's bathroom on the fourth floor. So I grabbed my towel and clean clothes, and underwear of course, and walked across the dormitory floor quietly so as not to wake Ginny or my fellow roomies as soon as I got outside the portrait hole I walked quickly down the stairs, as I had only just realised how cold it was at seven AM in the morning, and finally reached the fourth floor and the familiar smell of a steam room hit my nostrils so I skipped into the bathroom and was met with a lovely surprise!

'Luna! It's so nice to see you here! Do you always shower at this time? I've never seen you here before… Having said that though, this is the first time I've been up at the same time as the sun so I guess we've just missed each other!' I smiled at her and then jumped into the cubicle that I was standing in front of; I could still hear Luna even when the water was running! I love magic!

'It's lovely to see you in here too Scarlett. Why yes I do frequently have a shower at this time of the morning; it means I can clear my head and think about lots of lovely meadows and the like… Well at least I know that you will be down for breakfast this morning, won't you? She said with a slight chuckle in her voice

'Don't worry, Luna, I'll be there!' I replied

After I had let the warm water run all over me I jumped out of the cubicle changed into my school clothes, dried my hair using my wand and skipped out of the bathroom up to my dorm. I then set about getting ready for my first two lessons and breakfast; by the time I was all ready Ginny came bounding up to me and off we went to breakfast and to face the fourth day of life at Hogwarts…

_**(A.H.P)**_

'Hey Pansy,' I said from on the floor under a tree nearby the lake 'Draco' I sent a smile to both of my friends 'where's Blaise, Crabbe and Goyle?'

'Transfiguration. They got kept behind by McGonagall.' Pansy said 'they were disturbing the class apparently'

'Were they?' I asked

'Well yeah, to some extent but they were lead by me' Draco claimed laughing. Both of my friends were making me feel very small as they towered over me, luckily this is when they sat down to either side.

'So what have you been up to while waiting?' Pansy asked me

'Just being happy I'm alive. I just had double history of magic, which has got to be the _**worst **_lesson here'

'Agreed' Draco said. I felt perfectly at home, sitting beside my new best friends

'So where have you two been since you weren't kept behind?' I asked. It was about 10 minutes into lunch already.

'The common room, Draco wanted to put some things down and check the notice board' Pansy told me 'we brought some food out, I see you haven't got any yet. Want to share?'

'Uh, yes please. I forgot about lunch in my escape, why were you checking the notice board?'

'Quidditch, someone told me that it was on at some point soon so I checked in. it's after cooperative wizardry, apparently the Gryffindor have the pitch booked for last lesson.' Draco briefed 'so are you going to actually try out?'

'no.' I told him, I had decided after falling asleep in double history of magic that I wouldn't like the team at all. I loved hanging around with guys but they were all a tad too aggressive, except Draco of course, but he's not the best company to be alone with all the time. 'I wouldn't fit in _**and **_I haven't got a broom'

'Shame, it would be fun to have a girl on the team' he winked at me

'Draco!' Pansy told him off for me, saves me having to reject him again. We sat with each other happily eating lunch together for about fifteen minutes before Draco and I went to fetch more food as we were still hungry and most of our last lot had been thrown all over the floor around us.

As we walked indoors towards the great hall the massive group of Gryffindors came storming towards us. My sister in the middle. She didn't seem to see me as she chatted aimlessly to her friends. I hopelessly scanned the crowd for either of the visions but neither were seen before we reached the great hall. Draco and I made our way to the Slytherin table, we picked up a trial of literally every food we could, knowing that if we didn't like it we could just discard it onto the floor or towards the Gryffindor who we knew were now outside. As we left the hall the Weasley twins got up and left too, they were now walking in front of me. I half hoped they wouldn't turn around because of the contents of my hands and the company I was with but I would have loved to talk to them again. My mind was made up for me as both twins stopped in their tracks making me walk directly into them.

'Oops' they chorused as I stumbled backwards. Draco was standing beside me, seemingly ready to shout at them for being idiots but he never as they glared back at him.

'_Sorry Alyce' Fred said, I think it was Fred anyway. But whichever twin it was they'd just blown my cover; I didn't think Draco needed to know that I had spoken to them. I was about to mutter back a 'no problem' or an 'it doesn't matter' but Draco cut over me._

'_Don't talk to her you blood traitors!' there was something possessive in his tone that both I and the twins picked up on,_

'_Aw Alyce I think you have an admirer' the one that I thought was Fred joked. I had already turned red again but it was odd to see Draco going pink as he was usually so pale._

'_Fred, don't spoil their dreams' the other twin said 'you could see her the morning too, they both like each other. Fred thought you liked him Alyce, with all that staring you were doing at the breakfast tables' Okay, I no longer liked George as much even though I could tell he was kidding about. My mouth hung open slightly but I couldn't shut it as I faced the twins talking to us like that. Fred and George laughed, I knew they were joking around with us but only I was taking it friendlily. I could tell how worked up Draco was getting beside me but he dared not say anything as they could retort for him liking me._

'_Actually we're going out' Draco told them snidely. WHAT? Draco don't even joke about this!_

'_Liar, you know you haven't told her how much you like her.' George rebuked 'it's written all over your face. Fred's not as scared though are you bro'? Haha! You lot and you're blushing!'_

If only. My mind had wondered off for a minute. I was still stumbling backwards so I stopped myself.

'Sorry' one of the twins said to me with a small apologetic smile. I knew from the daydream that I had started to get a feeling more for Fred who I was certain was the one who had just spoken but tried to put it at the back of my mind. Draco took me by the forearm and practically dragged me around the two men blocking our path with a quiet mutter of 'stupid blood traitors' behind me I heard the conversation continue.

'Okay so you're going to the Owlery?'

'George!' said a girl's voice behind me,

'Angelina, what's up?'

'Uh just come to let you know, that Wood said we've got the pitch for last lesson.'

'Okay, well I've got to go to the Owlery. Tell Fred if I need to know anything else.' George's voice said. Everything went quiet except for the footsteps all around us, none were distinguishable from any others, Draco had now let go of my arm and we walked over to join Pansy again.

As we reached Pansy we began eating again, sensibly this time. I had my eye on the twin that had followed us from the hall; Fred. He was sitting beside Scarlett; I soon lost my appetite as she leaned over to him. Was something going on there too? Did she like more people than just Draco? At least I can see why this time, personality and appearance wise. Don't get me wrong I think Draco looks okay but _**Fred**_, he looked _**and**_ acted just right.

Scarlett and Fred made their way away from the group and, now in a small clear area, Scarlett jumped onto Fred's back as he lowered himself down slightly towards her level. A piggy back? The means of her 'transport' never surprised me, Scarlett had always been one to enjoy a piggy back ride, she liked how it meant she didn't have to walk everywhere even though it wasn't the most elegant means to get around. The one thing that stuck in my mind though was where were they going together? The thought of her going off with him was the most terrible thought that could _**ever**_ cross my mind. Slowly, laughing with Fred she made her way across our vision. I let her walk away before looking down at the ground.

'You know I talked to your sister yesterday' Draco told me

'You did? What a _**horrible**_ experience that must have been for you. I'm _**so**_ sorry.' I told him, only half joking.

'She wanted me to be _**nice**_ to the blood traitors.' he didn't seem to notice my humorous tone

'What did you say to that?' I asked him

'Basically I told her I don't play nice and she left.' Draco said vaguely, I had my eyes on him but he was staring off to wherever Scarlett had just gone off with Fred, there was something about him that was telling me he was doing this on purpose.

'Oh… so you don't like my sister either then?' I asked playfully

'Well she is _**very**_ good looking' he told me, I went back to looking at the floor, not sure how I felt about this. Momentarily forgetting that we were _**identical**_ twins - except for a few little details- but then maybe it was because of them little details he thought it. I kept my lips pressed together as I forced myself not to ask him who he liked more between us because it would make him think I liked him.

As we got back to eating, after ignoring the awkwardness of the conversation we had another friendly surprise from my twin - and by 'friendly surprise' I mean she came back riding, piggy back on the George. I could tell that this was George because Fred had come back almost immediately from before and continued a conversation he had been part of for a second before being taken away by Scary-Scarlett. This one didn't affect me as much, I could see where they were heading and anyway, it was only George. I watched as my twin was dropped onto the floor and ran towards the ginger girl again.

'So anyways, what do you think we'll be doing in co-operative wizardry? It's too early to need to catch up on things and Gryffindor have the quidditch pitch.' I asked

'Well maybe practising skills… some of the head of houses have other things to do so they don't teach, some do. Snape generally teaches, but he's surprisingly light-hearted when he's only teaching his house. I guess it'll be down to if Snape needs to do something or not during the lesson.'

'So where will we be if he's teaching? His classroom?' I asked again

'No. the common room, with the comfortable chairs… or usually anyway' Draco added

'Okay, cool' I brushed off

'What is that around your neck?' pansy asked 'something's reflecting the light.'

'Oh' I said, I already knew what she was talking about. 'My necklace. It's one of my most treasured possessions.' I reached up and undone the back of the sparkling jewel. Then taking the large necklace from my neck I lowered it towards my knee showing it off to Pansy. It was a very large delicately detailed item with several sparkling jewels, it looked rather old fashion but stylish at the same time 'when my great-grandmother died, when I was four, she gave it to me. It means so much.'

'Wow its really nice' Pansy told me, I moved my hands over slightly to show it to her closer. Suddenly right in front of my eyes my hand transformed into a plump cushion.

'OH MY GOD!' Pansy screamed, well that was an overreaction, I watched the necklace fall to the floor from my cushioned hand but as it hit the floor it too transformed into another plump green cushion, this time with the gems of the necklace sown into it, my heart tore as it felt into the dirt. I was going to _**kill**_ whoever done this. I looked up; Scarlett was on her feet and running towards the castle at full pelt. _**She has gone too far now! **_I found myself on my feet within a second and chasing her at the fastest I could run; I couldn't even feel my legs whirling beneath me. Soon I heard footsteps behind me and knew Scarlett's cronies were following u up the lawn. I was a lot faster than Scarlett and managed to catch up with her easily even though she'd had a head start.

Suddenly Scarlett stopped, why, I wasn't sure, but she stopped. I stopped as fast as I could and with my non-cushioned hand tapped her on the shoulder. We were still easily within reach of Draco and Pansy if I needed some quick support whether Scarlett's friends reached us first or not. She turned around hopefully, but all this hope slowly seeped away as she laid her eyes upon me.

'You know what that necklace was! FIX IT OR I'LL HEX YOU INTO NEXT WEEK!' I yelled at her uncontrollably, she looked ready to run again but I was sure she knew she wouldn't get away. Her eyes began to size me up for a fight or yet another yelling match but as her eyes met my hand she lost herself into childish hysterics. This in turn set off my friends in the corner of my eye. I was fighting the world here.

'Guys!' I called over to them, grabbing their attention 'Shut up! You're supposed to be _**my**_ friends! Why are you laughing along with her?' I realised how this must have sounded as they laughed more. I turned back to Scarlett who was laughing as if she'd seen the most hilarious thing in the world, so pathetic. My anger was threatening to boil over and mixed with the sadness from the necklace and my friends humiliating me I was ready to explode.

'You are such a child!' I told my sister sharply 'just because you're in the un-cool house and I get to hang around with Draco and Pansy doesn't give you the right to ruin the stuff that I hold dear to me' I felt my cushioned hand move slightly towards Draco and Pansy, instinctively, but I tried to whip it back to my side. 'Does it?' I challenged. Scarlett had stopped laughing but her glare was more than enough to send me over the edge. I reached out both of my mismatched hands and let them make contact with the top of her arms. With an easy motion I managed to force her onto the ground, a step causing a lot more painful looking fall than I had anticipated. My sisters eyes welled up again and two tall ginger boys stepped to one of my side, ducking down to my sister on the floor. Fred and George had witnessed the whole thing. I heard my sister's voice murmur something to them both and they hoisted her onto their shoulders. Both of them sent me identical looks of shock and hate which tore my heart some more. I watched them walk away a bit but holding myself together I turned around to my two "friends" and looking at them both I couldn't bring myself to walk to them. I shot them both an evil glare and turning on my heels ran into the castle.

I reached the hospital wing doors and before going in, I looked around to see no-one was nearby. I slowed myself to a walking pace and kicked the wall above the moving staircase angrily, trying to force my foot directly through the stone but obviously failing, even after several direct hits to the same spot. Now without any extra anger I made my way into the hospital wing. Madame Pomfrey was fussing over somebody in the corner but ordered me from distance to sit on the bed closest to me and 'just wait one moment'. I sat down facing the wall and let myself relive what had happened outside. Would I ever see my necklace again?

Soon Madame Pomfrey came bustling over to me, asking me what I had done and how.

'My twin _**cursed**_ my hand' I told her simply, okay so maybe I hadn't completely got out all my anger. Madame Pomfrey made me lean a hand on each of my knees so she could shrink my hand to the right size. She muttered a spell to her wand and as a searing pain struck my body working from my hands to my feet she focussed all her attention to making my hand the perfect size, even if it did hurt for a while longer. I felt as if I was about to faint as the scorching pain left my body at last.

'Take a second to get used to it and go to your lesson' she told me friendlily. I took a while to force myself to be sure I was ready to see Pansy and Draco again as I obliged to her command.

As I reached cooperative wizardry in the common room Pansy was in my face almost straight away, in her hand a shining jewel. A beautiful necklace that I recognised immediately. I couldn't hold back a grin and began to laugh as everything felt better and the pain in my hand suddenly disappeared with the rest of my worries.

'Draco fixed it. I'm sorry we laughed at you, it _**was**_ more at your sister's laugh than you, I promise.' she told me, I didn't care about them laughing anymore although I never knew how much I believed her. She handed me back the necklace but as I spotted Draco in the corner with Blaise, both with their eyes fixed on our confrontation; I ran directly to him. Now at a complete loss in control I threw both of my arms around Draco's neck, he was sitting down so this gesture immediately overturned the chair and as we hit the ground I clung so tightly to him and the necklace in my hand that I wasn't sure if Draco could breathe anymore. I suddenly came to my senses as I knew the entire common room's eyes were on us, I let go of Draco and rolled to the side of him quickly, apologising for the commotion. I looked up and saw a hook-nosed man staring down at us, Pansy at his side looking uncomfortable. Oh gosh, Snape saw the whole thing didn't he? This was not a good day. I needed to stop being so dramatic, I keep embarrassing myself.

'Miss Paiper' Snape said coldly above me. I gulped some air into my lungs and as gracefully as I could, I stood up while my legs shook. Draco also got up from the floor and stood up the chair, his face no more red than it had been at lunch as he was clearly unaffected apart from his new messy hairstyle I had managed to give him.

'Come with me' Snape ordered 'everybody do some homework until I return.' he added to the rest of the common room. Pansy's mouth dropped slightly as I was lead away by our head of house and I saw her join the boys table as the whole common room watched me leave.

As we left the common room we headed away from Snape's office.

'Sir I'm sorry about-' I began

'Quiet Miss Paiper, this is not about that, keep up child.' I sped up to walk only half a step or so behind my teacher

'Where _**are**_ we going?' I asked uncontrollably, I needed to zip my mouth shut before I got myself into more trouble.

'To the headmaster' he told me simply, oh great, I got myself into more trouble. 'He wishes to speak with you'

I was now stood on a revolving staircase, leading me up to the headmaster's office. As we reached the top Professor Snape reached out and knocked heavily on the door and the headmaster's voice invited us in. Snape opened the door and lead me inside, the office was full of interesting items that I couldn't help but stare at. Many I had seen before but just as many were entirely new to me. This was _**not**_ the time to look at my surroundings I told myself. I pinned my eyes onto the headmaster as he never exchanged eye contact with my head of house or myself, what was he waiting for? This answer came quickly as I heard the wall slide open at the bottom of the staircase and the staircase again began to rise. Slowly into view came my transfiguration teacher, quickly followed by the nervous looking head of my twin. So the meeting was about lunchtime. How pleasant, I think not. As my sister and her own head of house were greeted by Professor Dumbledore and the teachers sent away I readied myself for Dumbledore's lecture, or yell, or whatever he does to punish the pupils but it never came. Calmly as if we were talking about what would be for tea this evening he asked us to explain our sides of the story of our _**fascinating**_ lunchtime.

Soon Scarlett was sent away and I was left alone with Dumbledore, I had worked up a speech of my own in my head in which Draco's unknowing advise was crucial: 'Dumbledore's a push over for goody-goody things like birthday parties'. As I was asked to explain myself I was able to begin quite comfortably.

'well sir, I suppose it really started when Pansy saw something around my neck. She was just asking me what it was and I was just telling her. It was my necklace that my great-grandmother left to me once she died when I was four. Ever since then I have been wearing it as often as I've been allowed, it means so, so very much to me.' I was trying to play the innocent little girl card to gain some sympathy, as I had once been so good at this. 'well I was just taking it off for Pansy to view it better, as I love to look at it myself, it reminds me of my great-grandmother and all the happy memories we shared. But as I moved it closer it was hit by the spell my sister had cast at me. She has always known how much I love that necklace as I had been given it while we were still living together. She had also hit my hand and I dropped the necklace into the dirt, except now as a cushion. I saw Scarlett running towards the castle after her unprovoked attack so I went to talk to her but I'm afraid I lost my temper a little because I was so upset about the necklace.' I faded my speech to a close, I would have mentioned me pushing Scarlett over, but something about Dumbledore's glare told me that he already knew. I had my necklace wrapped up firmly in my hand still and I'm sure Dumbledore knew so too. I had played innocent, the uncharacteristic 'good girl' and the emotion strategies that I had perfected the use of on my dad, but for Dumbledore I never knew if it was going to be enough.


	9. STILL facing the music

_**(A.H.P)**_

I had been sent back to the common room by Dumbledore and I sat nervously telling Pansy and the group what was happening very quietly as Snape was watching over us all to make sure we were using the time well. Anybody who hadn't been working well was given potions ingredients to prepare for his future classes. Snape suddenly stopped and went towards the fire grate, I watched him fearfully, in the middle of telling Pansy what I had told Dumbledore. Snape nodded at the flames and stood up straight again.

'Miss Paiper' he called to me and again I followed him to the headmaster's office.

In this meeting to be simple about it, Dumbledore took 10 points from Gryffindor but 15 from Slytherin as 'pushing is not the Hogwarts way'. This was _**not**_ fair! I went to protest but he immediately spoke over me, how rude.

Scarlett and I left the office together and she began to painfully try and make friendly conversation.

'Ally, I'm really sorry that Dumbledore took five extra points off of your house, just because you pushed me over; when we all know why you did it.' Scarlett told me

'Yeah, well you never took the points away, so forget it' I said half-heartedly

'Yes, but still. I hate the fact that us two fight all the time _**and**_ our houses are rivals!' she pointed out,

'They only say the houses are rivals, that doesn't mean every person has to be rivals. But its just the way we are, S we always have fought' I replied 'I mean can you name one time we actually got along?'

'When we were four' she said with a weak smile, no-one spoke for a while 'Ally? You Ok?'

'Yeah, I was just thinking of the necklace… and our great grandma's funeral…but it's okay'

'I'm so sorry about the whole Charm thing, I forgot you'd super-glued it to your neck' Scarlett said, beginning by sniffing back tears but finishing by laughing slightly.

'It's okay, Draco fixed it for me' I told her simply

'Wow... D-D-Draco's really talented isn't he' Scarlett said, blushing

'Uh... yeah I suppose' I replied awkwardly, I knew she was thinking of Draco anyway.

'Well I'm still glad Fred and George were there to save the day' she told me quickly

'Yeah... I umm... didn't hurt you, did I?' I said, still smiling but I could feel myself reddening slightly on the cheeks. I didn't really care whether I had hurt her, a part of me hoped I did as I was still annoyed but I _**had **_ to move on from the twins part of the conversation.

'You? Hurt me? Nah it was just a shock that was all' Scarlett dismissed

'Ok... Good' I said, partially unhappy and partially guilty for feeling unhappy.

'Good? Did you just say good?' I asked 'what the heck has Draco done to you? Or more specifically the twins?' she asked. Oh no the conversations back.

'The - the -the twins? What do u mean?' I asked dismissively 'and no-ones done anything to me!'

'Oh come on Ally! I've seen the way you look at them, and at lunchtime yesterday! I'm your twin! I know these things!' she told me, damn it! I knew she'd seen my red face yesterday

'No, they were just being... Embarrassing' I dismissed again 'how can u hang out with them really?'

'They're funny! Make me smile and laugh, damn sight better than Malfoy and Pansy!' Scarlett told me, patronisingly.

'Oh yeah? Pansy is a fantastic friend, and I _**know**_ you like Draco' I told her, yey I was back on track.

'HOW? I haven't shown any signs!' she shouted

'Oh yeah! _**Signs**_? There couldn't be more _**signs**_' what? It was true!

'Like what? Oh yeah your little stunt at break this morning was to show me up wasn't it? WELL THANKS A MILLION ALLY!' she huffed

'To teach you a lesson. You should've heard yourself in Potions! How pathetic you sounded, if you don't want the world to know then don't scream at it.' I advised her, then in an imitation of the Potions lesson speech, I added 'Draco just smiled and winked at me! How often do you see Ron or Harry do that!'

'Oh and you blushing at Fred and George wasn't as bad?' she accused me,

'You don't have a clue what they were saying! Of course I was blushing, you would've been too if you were there!' I told her angrily

'Alyce and Fred sitting in a tree K-I-S-S-I-N-G! See ya loser' she told me patronisingly and ran off towards her friends. How childish!

I sat down at the Slytherin table, my friends were already here as the bell for the end of the day rang as I reached Dumbledore's office.

'how'd it go?' Pansy asked me as I sat down. I finished my story that I had started before I left the common room. She listened carefully and was a fantastic audience, she protested as I had tried to do so and told me how unfair she too found it; I hadn't even hurt Scarlett and it was _**totally**_ unjustified.

'he always did prefer the Gryffindors' Pansy told me snootily.

'that pile of hippogriff dung!' Draco said, I looked at Pansy to confirm I'd heard him right… Draco doesn't like hippogriffs? 'I know what'll cheer you up Alyce' he continued

'yeah?' I asked, now picking at my dinner.

'yeah. Come with me to quidditch tryouts in half an hour - it's okay u can just watch if you'd prefer - and then after you can use my broom to go flying, when you see it you wont be able to say no.'

'what is it?' I asked him interested

'no, no, don't want to ruin the surprise now, do we?' he told me 'you'll have to come along and see.'

'okay' I smiled slightly at him to let him know the effort was appreciated.

Half an hour later I separated myself from Draco to find a good seat in the stands as he went to change. I found a seat level with the hoops and in the centre of the pitch so I could see all the action around me. I wasn't the only one there but I never planned on mingling much; especially as many had picked up on it being my fault for the loss of, lets face it: a small amount of almost completely insignificant points and had taken the opportunity to let me know how they felt about it. A few others had also decided to drag up my unfortunate encounter with Snape after the trashing of the common room - and Draco's hair.

Soon, as I managed to blank out the jeers from the other Slytherins around me, the current Slytherin quidditch team followed by many other Slytherin members from a range of year groups all dressed in similar build outfits, though many failed massively at looking like the quidditch uniform. Draco seemed to have brought a proper uniform, just not the entire uniform yet. None of my year had even attempted to get in and only 2 girls were there, looking rather weak compared to all of the boys, even the youngest ones, yet neither were of a seeker build either and so looked rather out of place and useless to the team.

Each of the people gave an interesting performance in their tasks, many a good effort, but others the complete opposite. Draco was one of the good people in the running, as I saw it he only had one competition and that was Sebastian King. He was the sort of boy who wasn't afraid to knock anyone off of their brooms and although being very tall he could stay so low on his broom to keep a fast speed and was still able to keep even the school brooms on an obedient roll. However Draco seemed unperturbed at the competition as if - and I reminded myself, it was probably true - he had something up his sleeve. As I expected when Draco left the sky he made a deal of asking who had got the place as seeker, only to be told to be quiet and to 'get out of the way so I can get on with it' by Flint, who had a badly hidden smirk on his face. I was tempted to go down to the pitch to talk to Draco after his go but settled with sending him a thumbs up and a grin. I still hadn't been able to see Draco's broom properly but at least I knew it was fast, since it was _**always**_ a blur.

Soon Flint cleared away everything and everybody on the pitch - except Draco and myself, saying that he'd pin the team members name's onto the notice board tomorrow. I made my way down to Draco and as soon as I reached him I checked out his broom: A nimbus 2001. WOW! I wanted this broom so badly, but knew by the end of the year, something better may have come to the shops for me to beg my dad for. Flint said goodbye to us and left the pitch too leaving me with Draco, staring at his broom.

At first Draco gave me the impression he was worried about my flying ability before going up on his broom and I had to fly the slow school brooms to show him I could fly while he zoomed around at twice the speed. That show off! Haha. I leant flat into the school broom allowing me to catch up with the rather relaxed Draco, who glided along as if it were a slow speed. After 5 minutes of messing with me Draco allowed me onto his broom, now taking the school broom to fly with me. As soon as kicking off of the ground I let the broom take me faster and higher than I had ever flown, not to Draco's amusement at all but a definite mood raiser for me.

We continued flying until it was getting difficult to see each other. I wanted very much to fly back to the common room and enter through the window but Draco wouldn't let me with his new broom, even though he liked the idea too.

Ten minutes later, after Draco had changed from his try out uniform and he had practically wrestled me off of his nimbus we were walking towards our common room together, still talking about flying and quidditch - one of the few things we had in common. He was still making notions to tell me he liked me - less subtly than I'm sure he meant them to but I remembered his words from lunchtime ('Well she is _**very**_ good looking') and couldn't help but feel distanced more from him even more so than before. Was he just flirting with me because _**I **_look like _**her**_? Or maybe he liked me and I took a compliment the wrong way, he was coming on rather strong - he always did, even before seeing _**her**_. My eyes were staring into his awkwardly. I don't even like Draco so I don't know why I'm getting so obsessed with him liking her but it bugs me still, she bugs me, he bugs me… especially when I'm sent mixed signals like this. We walked back into the common room, and for once we were _**both**_ more than happy to see Pansy in the corner with Draco's owl.  
'Draco I think it's your dad's letter' she told us as we reached her 'the owl wont let me anywhere near it's leg so I'm certain of it!' Draco took the letter easily from the owl's leg, without saying a word to Pansy and read the parchment to himself as we watched him. Soon he folded the letter away into his pocket.  
'he said he'll ask… if I make it onto the quidditch team.' He told us, almost solemnly 'more was riding on tonight than I thought'  
'it's okay, it's okay' I told him 'you done brilliantly tonight and Flint obviously thought u were better than that Seb King guy.'  
'thanks' he told me unconvinced 'I'm going to bed, night' and with that he left. Neither of us were sure of how we felt but soon made our own ways up our separate staircase.

That night I had a nightmare about Draco, he fell off his broom and got kicked off of the quidditch team and pitch - literally. Then his father waiting outside was there to hit him for it and took away Draco's broom so he never had a chance to disappoint him again. I woke up with a pang of horror, poor Draco, was his father like that really? Today I had woken up at a normal time, I went downstairs and immediately checked the notice board, no quidditch notice was yet up.

I waited in the common room, on the arm of the chair, swaying backwards and forwards until I heard large feet on the boy's staircase. I stood up as the male came into view. Flint.  
'It's you!' I said loudly, uncontrollably. He looked at me but barely saw me 'Have you decided the quidditch team yet?' I asked him urgently  
'what's it to you? Did you want to try out? 'Cus I think what you're looking for is the shrinking potions club' he told me, I was on the edge of my nerve as it was  
'no. I wanted to know if Draco got in.' I told him 'he needs this more than you'd realise'  
'what's in it for you?' he asked suspiciously  
'Draco's my friend' I told him, now _**very**_ annoyed. He kept looking at me suspiciously, I went to the final straw 'please let him on the team! I'll do anything'  
'woah kid!' he stopped me 'you really want this? Malfoy's not going to seem like someone that would use the kids to get ahead- no, Malfoy's already on the team. I've got the list here. He's the best man for the job.' he lifted his hand revealing a scroll in his hand, how had I not noticed that? I grinned back at him.  
'Malfoy knew he was on the team ages ago. If you're really that closer mates he would've told you. I mean we all saw you try to knock him out and destroy the common room in one go yesterday but patience child. Now why don't you run off to confirm it with him.' he suggested, as he had suggested I left the common room in a rush to tell Draco, and to pretend I never knew that he'd known before hand. A celebration breakfast was in order.

_**(S.V.P)**_

I reached breakfast on a high, having a shower at 7AM strangely made me happy, I saw the faces of my friends and realised that I was a little crazy to be so awake!

'Good morning sleepy heads! Why do you all look so depressed? Ginny we have Transfiguration and Charms for our first two lessons be happy!'

'I'm glad you're really happy and all Scarlett but my dear brother here (pointing at Ron) has just had a HUGE go at me for nothing!'

I suddenly snapped out of my mood and turned to face all of my friends, but I focused more on Ron.

'Erm… Ron? Why did you snap at Gin? Bad mark in Potions? Hermione getting to you again?'

His head snapped up at me; he looked like he was about to hex me into the middle of next year… (_Ohmigosh he knows!)_

'Scarlett! YOU BLOODY IDIOT! Why did you have to go and lose us 10 points? We were soooo close to winning the house cup and now? Well we have better chance of Snape actually liking us!'

I flinched at his outburst even though I knew I deserved every word of it… I happened to catch the rest of my friend's eyes and they all looked so disappointed in me! But hang on; Alyce lost 15 points from Slytherin so in theory we're still in the lead by five points… So with that I opened my mouth and rebuked him:

'Ronald Weasley! I'll have you know that my sister lost her house 15 points! (I turned round and looked Draco straight in the eye) Yeah! That's right Malfoy 15 points! So would you please mind shutting up and doing what you do best – eating so that Ginny and I can go off to Transfiguration? Thank you very much!' With that I sat down and tucked into my breakfast of porridge with maple syrup all over it – yummy!

After we'd eaten, in silence, Ginny and I skipped off to Transfiguration arm in arm having totally forgotten my outburst at Ron. In Transfiguration we were repeating the last few lessons work; I loved Transfiguration I really did but did McGonagall **have** to make us repeat the same spell over and over again? I poked Ginny on the elbow,

'Hey Gin? I'm really sorry that Ron took the 10 points loss thing out on you… I have no idea how he found out though. Maybe he isn't quite as dumb as we think he is, eh?'

She turned to look at me and chuckled a little

'Yeah! That's a revelation in itself. But hey Scarlett? Cheer up Ron's just annoyed that together him, Harry and now you have lost Gryffindor a total of 110 points, so yeah it's a touchy subject'

After hearing what she had just said to me I almost fell on the floor in shock, instead however, I burst into tears

"Ginny I am so sorry what with Fred and George clocking up losses for Gryffindor and now you're best mate! I really don't mind if you never want to speak to me again, I honestly mean that!' I said whilst wiping my nose and eyes on the sleeve of my cloak. Ginny eventually took pity on me and gave me a packet of tissues whilst consoling me,

'Scarlett, hey, calm down it's not all bad… Ron and Harry did deserve those point deductions they flew a flippin' car to school! As for your point loss well sibling rivalry is bound to happen round here, just look at me and my brothers for an indication, but I can understand why Dumbledore deducted 10 points for charming Alyce's hand… but why did she get 15 deducted; not that I'm complaining just curious?'

'She got 15 deducted because she pushed me over, whilst she never actually caused me any harm, and it's not the Hogwarts way apparently.'

'Ohh yes that does make much more sense now' she replied, by this time we were out of the classroom on our way to Charms.

On the way there I happened to spot Fred and George huddled in a corner looking as if they had just pranked someone so with that I promptly walked over to them and squeezed between them,

"Hello you two! Why do you look like cat's that have got the cream?" I looked up into Fred's beautiful blue eyes and saw that he was smirking down at me

"Now, now that would be telling wouldn't it?" He replied…. He was very annoying sometimes!

"Pretty please Fred?" the only person I ever begged was Mummy and that was only when she wouldn't let me take Bicky outside to play in the garden when I was six.

He gestured towards the Charms classroom "haven't you and Ginny got a lesson to be getting to? Go on get to it toodle pip!" With that he and his twin had disappeared behind a column and Ginny and I were left to trundle into our second lesson.

Once inside the Charms classroom Ginny and I flopped down into our usual desk off to the right of where Professor Flitwick was. We then spent the next hour perfecting _'Spongify' _I kept blushing all the while remembering what had happened to my sister when I was practicing it yesterday lunchtime…. The lesson finally ended and we were dismissed and told to continue practicing the charm – I'm convinced I saw Professor Flitwick wink at me – so without any hesitation Ginny and I raced from the classroom towards the lake.

When we reached the spot that our friends were sitting down at Ginny and I ran the rest of the way to them and dropped our bags and laid out on the grass breathing heavily and we just happened to look up when we saw 5 pairs of eyes looking at us totally confused

"You two OK down there?" Harry asked – I went a light pink at hearing his voice for the first time today….

"Err…. Yeah fine thanks Harry…." Ginny replied – she was a lot redder then me!

"Well, well Scarlett you do seem to get yourself into a few weird positions don't you?" I gulped and looked up into the smirking face of Fred Weasley – from this angle I could understand (yes you did hear that right) why Alyce found him fanciable! "C'mon let's get you back to a sitting position shall we?" There he was holding out both of his hands expecting me to put my hands into them so that he could pull me up…. Instead all I could do was nod furiously until such times as Ginny poked me, hard, in the ribs so just like that I took Fred's hands and hauled myself up into a sitting position and grinned back at him

"Thank you!"

"You're very welcome Miss Paiper"

Ginny groaned from behind us "haven't you got some people to go and prank or, Merlin forbid, homework to be doing?"

With that Fred's head turned to his little sister's "I do, but seeing as you're not mum I'm not going to listen to you." And just like that he plonked himself down next to me and Ron and putting his hands onto the grass stared out over the lake.

I, on the other hand, started to frantically rummage through my bag so that I could make a start on my Transfiguration homework; I was rummaging so hard that I knocked into Hermione's elbow with my own

"Ohh sorry 'Mione! I totally forgot you were sitting there!"

"It's OK Scarlett; you look a little bit stressed anything I can help you with?" She asked me kindly

"You would be a total life-saver! We were set some Transfiguration homework first lesson but I really don't want it hanging over my head; would you mind helping me?" I looked at her with pleading eyes

"Of course I will; but not right this second as lessons are starting in ten minutes. Don't you think you should be grabbing your stuff?"

With that I bolted from the grass, leaving my bag behind, and raced up to the common room to grab my books for History of Magic and then legged it back down the seven flights of stairs – this is a day when I needed the twins piggy backs again – I reached the bottom panting like a dog and had my bag flung over my arm by who I can only assume was Ginny who then gently tugged me towards our History of Magic classroom where I could finally get my breathing back to normal whilst I listened to Professor Binns drone on and on….

Once that lesson was over we headed to the flying pitch for, you guessed it, our fourth lesson of the day! This plus our last lesson were the two I had been dreading _**all**_ day… As we reached the quidditch pitch there were a line of Slytherins opposite the Gryffindors as usual, almost a symbolism of the rivalry between houses. I noticed that my twin wasn't there, I barely had a second to consider where she was before Ginny was pulling me into the line-up enthusiastically as instructed by Madam Hooch. I wanted the lesson to speed up, get it over with, but for now I was happy to have my feet fixed on the ground. Naturally, since I said this, we were ordered into the air to practise our turning, my sister still wasn't here - of all lessons for her to miss, I would have thought she'd want to be _**here**_. I attempted to talk to Ginny as we flew but she was too interested in the lesson and on every corner I'd spin out slightly so it was almost impossible to keep up with her.

Suddenly I spotted my sister run onto the pitch below us, Madam Hooch landed her broom beside Alyce as she stopped. I slowed my broom down and drew to a halt a little out of Madam Hooch's view. Alyce spotted me though, she looked up and sent me an unjustified look of disgust. I felt the same to her, but I wondered how many points she'd lose her house. I'm sure Ron would be happy if I tell him about that, it would definitely redeem myself from earlier. I felt some air move behind me, and turned slightly to see Ginny.

'Come on Scarlett, what are you waiting for?' she asked

'Shh' I hushed her, she looked towards Alyce too

'oh,' she whispered at me, I never turned this time 'I think I heard the twins mention earlier that _**she **_has been late to all of her lessons today. How many points do you think she's lost _**just**_ today?' I kept watching Madam Pomfrey, my sister worked her way out of losing points (sending me a smirk as she did so, I _**hate**_ her) and Madam Hooch turned to me and Ginny

'shows over girls' she told us, we started flying again.

'I hope she lost hundreds' I said sourly to Ginny as we flew back into the circle of flyers together. Something touched the back of my broom and I turned to see Colin Creevey, a boy from Gryffindor, veer of course directly into the wall of the castle. I gasped,

'did I do that?' I asked Ginny, I rushed to the ground, hitting my feet hard on the ground as I landed, but happy to be on the ground nonetheless. With a simple swish from the pitch, we were left standing around waiting for the teacher to return from the hospital wing. I had a chance to talk to Ginny properly at last. Once Madam Hooch had returned from the hospital wing we only had 15 minutes of the lesson left, and we had to do the dreaded suggested races.

My race was between Ginny, a boy from Slytherin, Alyce and myself. When we started I was unsurprised to see Ginny and Alyce pulling completely ahead of us, leaving me in particular behind. I leant into my broom as much as I could but the fear of falling and my bad turns made it near impossible to even stay in sight of the others. I kept looking up, watching Ginny's and Alyce's race in front of me. Ginny took over noticeably several times before my sister closed the gap and occasionally even took over herself. At the time they finished they were at the point that the gap was so incredibly close nobody could tell who had finished first. I sped up a little, not worrying too much about the last bend and as the others ahead of me drew to a firm stop I reached the final inches and pulled myself to a steadier stop, and congratulated Ginny. At least this was the end of it, we could leave at last!

After that dreadful, on my part, flying lesson I was pretty hungry so after dumping my History of Magic books, and picking up my things for Transfiguration, I followed Ginny out of the portrait hole and down to the Great Hall to see what gorgeous food awaited us for our lunch. As soon as we reached the hall I scanned it for Harry, Ron, Hermione and the twins; I could only find the 'golden trio' so I was about to open my mouth and ask Ron where Fred and George had gotten to when I heard something that made my spine shiver…


End file.
